Court Delays Findings on Deaf Users' Netflix Access
(CN) - Netflix can stay claims that it failed to provide equal access for the deaf and hard of hearing, pending an investigation about close-captioning for Internet media, a federal judge ruled.
The National Association of the Deaf sued Netflix, the leading American provider of online streaming media, in June for not providing equal access to its Watch Instantly on-demand service. It alleges that Netflix has refused to make close-captioned text available for the deaf and hard of hearing.
According to the 2011 Sandvine Global Internet Phenomena Report, cited in the complaint, Netflix's Watch Instantly site is the "biggest source of Internet traffic in the U.S."
Nevertheless, a third-party database, Instant Watcher, noted that less than 5 percent of Netflix's Watch Instantly titles offered captions, as of June 2011, according to the complaint.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/11/22/41666.htm