Closed Captioning Availability

[UB Alumni Caree]

Our university is forcing us to move from GoToWebinar (which we have been using for our weekly webinar program since 2016) to Zoom for accessibility - specifically closed captioning. This is a non-negotiable for the university and I don't blame them. But if we could give an expected time frame for when this would be available on GTW, I don't believe they would force our hands this way. Our program is so solidly cemented in GTW, our weekly webinar team is very unhappy with this situation.

We've shown the university the transcripts and were told transcripts does not equal accessibility. We've shared how to use closed captioning in Powerpoint and Google but not all presenters use these platforms so the accessibility is not consistent. Which means the university does not consider the webinar program accessibilty compliant.

Is there any idea or timeframe when closed captioning might be officially part of GoToWebinar? 

[KateG]

@UB Alumni Caree Thanks for your post and sharing this with GoTo. I have passed your situation on to the team. While Closed Caption is a feature we are currently reviewing, I do not have an estimated time frame to share currently. I understand this may not be want to hear and appreciate all the workarounds you have used. We will certainly update the Community when we have more information on the availability of this feature.  

[pala04]

Hi Team,

will this feature(live captions) get enabled on Webinar, in upcoming future
or not?

Regards
Suraj

[GlennD · Accepted solution]

Hi @pala04, welcome to the community.

Yes, we are working on Closed Captioning. I believe it may be available for GoToMeeting first. Once we are closer to a public release I will update the community.

[FFlores]

Yes, I've also had to stop using GTW because of the lack of accessibility features, closed captions in particular. I hope this is something that is being worked on.

[aldersv99]

Although this isn't a perfect solution we use the closed caption option on Powerpoint (can be found slide show tab then select always use subtitles) i believe this only works with office 365 but not 100%.  It then shows the captioning for the speaker who is sharing their screen, it its multiple speakers it doesn't work so good and  obviously no good if your not sharing powerpoint.   

The problem we have it is either on or off for delegates and some find it very distracting.  We are also looking at other options as its a much needed function. 

[MeganUSAC]

Our organization uses GoToWebinar for external stakeholder webinars. We have encountered several technical difficulties using Google Slides and PowerPoint as a workaround for closed captioning for our webinars (inconsistent speaker pick-up, and occasional profanity appearing the the transcription). We are researching other webinar vendors that have closed captioning built into the webinar platform but ideally would like to continue using GTW given user familiarity with the system and the ease of sharing materials with attendees during live webinars. Through my research on these forums, I learned that Closed Captioning is a potential future feature for GoTo platforms that would likely initially roll out on GoToMeeting and then GoToWebinar. I was wondering if this feature is still forthcoming and if there are any updates on the timeline of the delivery of a Closed Captioning feature in GTW. 

Thank you for any insights you may be able to provide and considering a Closed Captioning feature for inclusion in 

[KateG]

@MeganUSAC welcome to the GoTo Community. 

I moved your post to this similar conversation. Thanks for sharing your experience. We anticipate Captions coming to GoTo soon for GoTo Meeting. GoTo Webinar will follow, though I don't have a timeline. We will update the Community as soon as we have further information. Thanks. 

[aldersv99]

Unfortunately as an organisation we are getting a large backlash of attendees being very negative about our webinars due to no closed captions, we too want to stay with go to webinar but have had to look at alternatives as not providing them can't carry on.  I appreciate you are working on this but it's really too slow in coming when your competitors have had this for a long time. 😞