As of today, scribit makes videos accessible to the blind and visually impaired
Today, Vereniging Bartiméus Sonneheerdt launched scribit.tv, an innovative online platform for the blind and visually impaired.
A place where anybody can enrich beauty tutorials, online talk shows, prank vlogs and virals by adding an audio description; a technique where a voice-over describes what is happening in the visual footage during periods of silence in a video. This makes video content accessible to the approximately 350,000 blind and visually impaired people in the Netherlands. Scribit would not have been possible without the efforts of volunteers and technology and financial resources that were contributed by KPN's Mooiste Contact Fonds.
Join in - share moments of laughter and sorrow, talk about trending topics, get involved!
That is scribit in a nutshell. A billion hours of YouTube videos are watched around the world every day, but online videos are seldom accompanied by an audio description. An audio description can be added to the video content on scribit.tv so that blind and visually impaired people can also participate in the hot topics of the day.
"We live in a visually oriented society and YouTube is a fantastic source of information and entertainment. If we are also able to access those videos, to a certain extent at least, we will be one step closer to an inclusive society", says scribit Community Manager Falco van Dinteren. He and a team of ambassadors, who, like Falco, are also visually impaired, are committed to recruiting narrators and endorsing the importance of scribit.
Collaboration between Vereniging Bartiméus Sonneheerdt and KPN's Mooiste Contact Fonds
Around 350,000 people in the Netherlands suffer from a visual impairment. Vereniging Bartiméus Sonneheerdt has dedicated itself to bettering the lot of these people since 1915. KPN's Mooiste Contact Fonds selected scribit as one of the projects that they considered worthy of financial support during their anniversary year. The fund was set up by KPN with the aim of encouraging social contact between people who currently lead lonely lives. The fund has successfully brought people who feel lonely and cut-off in contact with their environment or their peers for more than ten years. Every year, between 1,500 and 2,000 KPN volunteers participate in the fund’s projects. ICT is used in all projects in order to facilitate social contact.