I Grew Up Watching TVs and Movies with Always-on Closed Captioning

Published under Mango Paper, Apr 27, 2019

Jason Kottke brought up the closed captioning topic today:

A few months ago I noticed that several friends (who speak English and aren’t deaf) routinely watch TV and movies with closed captions and subtitles on. I asked about this on Twitter and the resulting thread was fascinating. Turns out many of you watch TV this way for all kinds of different reasons — to follow complex dialog in foreign or otherwise difficult accents, some folks better retain information while reading, keeping the sound down so as not to wake sleeping children in tight living spaces, and lots of people who aren’t deaf find listening difficult for many reasons (some have trouble listening to dialogue when there’s any sort of non-ambient noise in the background).

When I came to U.S. and started watching TVs and movies, as a non-native speak I was very frustrated that there are no closed captioning. I also didn't know there is the option to turn it on. I wouldn't even think that TV technology actually supports separate closed-captioning data.

You see, I grew up in China. All TVs and movies have always-on closed captioning baked into the stream. There is no option to turn it off.

You ask why that's the case in China?

First, there are many varieties of spoken Chinese with many dialects underneath. Most of TVs and movies are spoken in mandarin. Especially in earlier years, many of the population don't or have difficulties to understand it. But for written Chinese, they are the same, mostly. So closed captioning is understood by more people.

Second, more importantly, homophones. Even though there are tens of thousands of Chinese characters, there are only 1327 pronunciations. That means there are just so many homophones. For common phrases, it not a big problem and we can narrow down further from surrounding context. But for things like names, it's just not possible to know what are the Chinese characters they are speaking. So we rely on close captioning.

Of course, there is also the accessibility reason for people who have hearing loss. But it doesn't explain why closed captioning is the default and there is no option to turn off.

Purl | Pixar SparkShorts

Published under Mango Paper, Feb 5, 2019

Please also watch the Meet the Filmmakers Behind Purl video. It's only one minute long.

Styrofoam

Published under Mango Paper, Jan 10, 2019

A great little film by Noah Sheldon.

82% Of the Moon Belongs to the Far Side

Published under Mango Paper, Jan 6, 2019

Everyone knows that moon has a far side. But you might be surprised that the far side consists of 82% of the surface area. We can only see 18% of the moon from the earth.

Happy New Year

Published under Mango Paper, Jan 1, 2019

Happy New Year! Hope I can double my portfolio in 2019. Here is a good start - concept for my next game BaBalloons.

If the Moon Were Replaced With Some of Our Planets

Published under Mango Paper, Dec 13, 2018

Yeti Dynamics shows us what if the moon were replaced with some of our planets:

On Jupiter, you might be able to make out the 4 big moons, They all have orbits larger than our moons orbit. but I stuck them on the far side of jupiter so that they could be seen so it looks as if they are closer (to Jupiter) than they really are.

Another video from them showing what if the moon were at the same distance as the International Space Station is also fascinating.

Love Chrome's New Design

Published under Mango Paper, Sep 19, 2018

Chrome's new design has been released for two weeks now. Usually a redesign of a daily app would bring lots of hate initially but eventually you just get used to it. Strangely, I fell in love with this new design since the first second.

The only thing I don't like this the "Find in page" box on desktop. The box really feels disconnected from the Chrome itself, and I'm still not used to it: