Media Accessibility Observatory

About

The Media Accessibility Observatory, established at the University of Warsaw, aims to create a group, independent of broadcasters and providers, that will monitor the quality of access services in Poland. These services include subtitling for the deaf and the hard of hearing, sign language interpretation, and audio description. We take inspiration from renowned centres like the GALMA Media Accessibility Observatory at the Universidad de Vigo in Spain and the OPEN Centre at the Universiteit Antwerpen in Belgium.

In our inaugural study, carried out in partnership with the National Broadcasting Council, we focused on the quality of subtitling on news channels. Our interest primarily revolved around live subtitling, with a keen focus on aspects like accuracy, latency, text reduction and the presentation of subtitles. A comprehensive report of this study was presented on 14 September 2023.

Publications

2023

• AVT Lab partnered with Media Accessibility Observatory to publish a report on the quality of live news TV in Poland (full report available in Polish).  
  
  Dutka, Ł., Szczygielska, M., Szarkowska, A., Szeląg, K., Dobrowolska, A., Senda, T., Urban, A., & Grabska, A. (2023). Raport o jakości napisów na żywo w polskich stacjach telewizyjnych. Obserwatorium Dostępności Mediów Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, Warszawa.
  
  Summary of the “Report on the Quality of Live Subtitles” in easy-to-read text (in Polish) [Streszczenie “Raportu o jakości napisów na żywo” w formie tekstu łatwego do czytania (ETR) w języku polskim]