My first experience with a tornado was at the age of five. My Oklahoma childhood home in the late 1970s, as well as all those in our neighborhood, didn’t have a basement or cellar. A group of 20 of us gathered in an underground community storm shelter. We sat in complete darkness, save for the … Continue reading
Filed under Advocacy …
A Story About Six of My ‘Girlfriends’
This weekend, I traveled to Atchison, Kansas, as guest speaker for the inaugural “Grace & Girlfriends.” The one-night Christian event gathered women from different states for three hours of music, storytelling, and oodles of encouragement. It was the brainchild of author and speaker Pamela Sonnenmoser with Fresh Cup Ministries. I watched the attendees, ages 7 … Continue reading
The Suze Orman Show Refuses to Provide Online Captions
By Russ Kane, Volunteer with the Lipreading Mom Internet Captions Campaign Suze Orman is one of the most prominent financial writers and TV personalities in our American society. She has sold millions of books and she has so many fans. She first started as a waitress in Berkeley, California and became a financial adviser for … Continue reading
Warren Theatres to Show Captioned Movies
If you live near a Warren Theatre and haven’t been able to enjoy captioned movies there, you are in luck. The Wichita, Kansas-based theater chain is currently testing captioning equipment for all of its locations. Warren Theatres was brought to my attention by Aaron Michael Smith, a member of the Deaf community in Oklahoma City. … Continue reading
Lipreading Mom Applauds Captioning Lawsuit Against CNN
If you have been following the Lipreading Mom Internet Captions Campaign, you know that I believe all network Websites should caption their videos for the thousands of people in the U.S. with hearing loss. Now one of those networks has been sued. A lawsuit has been brought about in California against CNN and its parent … Continue reading
Can Captions Help Our Kids Learn?
As the mom of three young children, I am concerned about the programs they watch on TV and the Internet. While there are parental controls for what they view on television, there is no control over whether or not the programs they watch via computer are captioned. I partnered with the Collaboration for Communication Access … Continue reading
What Happened to Netflix Captioning? An Update
The truth about Netflix‘s recent lack of captions has been revealed. And thank goodness. Lipreading Mom was about to permanently cancel her trial subscription. According to Mike Chapman, a volunteer advocate with the Collaboration for Communication Access via Captioning (CCAC), Netflix’s captioning system went “haywire” over the past week. CCAC has partnered with me on … Continue reading
Activist/Author Arlene Romoff Changes the Captioning World
As a teenager, Arlene Romoff began to progressively lose her hearing. It became a profound loss several years later. In 1997, she received her first cochlear implant and a second one in 2008. The author of two memoirs, Hear Again: Back to Life with a Cochlear Implant and Listening Closely: A Journey to Bilateral Hearing, … Continue reading
Why Lipreading Mom Should Cancel Netflix
“If Netflix captioned all of its movie offerings, would you renew our subscription?” This was the question I posed to my Hubby several months after we cancelled the on-demand video service. “Uh, sure honey.” He knows better than to argue with Lipreading Mom when she’s trying to make a point. After discovering through Philixie.com that … Continue reading
Would You Join Me in Thanking These Two Legislators?
For those of you as passionate about Internet captions as Lipreading Mom is, we have some powerful fans on our side. Memorize these names: U.S. Representative Edward Markey (Massachusetts) and U.S. Congressman Mark Pryor (Arkansas). Rep. Markey and Congressman Pryor authored the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010. This legislation is the … Continue reading
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