Closed captioning symbol (CC)

How to read it

Closed captions are text on the screen that gives the speech and other relevant sounds of a TV programme, film, video or exhibit. The FCC describes closed captioning as displaying the audio portion of a television program as text on the TV screen for people who are deaf or hard of hearing. The Graphic Artists Guild, whose access symbols include the letters CC, notes that captions are commonly known as subtitles and transcribe speech, though not necessarily word for word. A TV needs a decoder, built in or separate, to display them; the Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990 required new TV sets with screens of 13 inches or larger to have built-in decoders from July 1993, Stanford University’s guide says.

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Closed or open captions

The Guild has two symbols. CC marks captions the viewer can switch on. OC, open captioning, marks captions that are displayed on the film, video or programme itself, so everyone sees them.

Who designed the symbol

The CC in a TV screen came from The Caption Center at WGBH, the Boston public broadcaster. Geoff Freed of the CPB/WGBH National Center for Accessible Media wrote in 1997 that it had become the standard way of showing closed captioning, and that The Caption Center gave it out free with no restrictions. He added that it should not be confused with the TV-with-a-tail symbol, which belongs to the National Captioning Institute.

What the FCC rules say

In the US, Congress requires cable operators, broadcasters, satellite services and other distributors to caption their TV programmes. The FCC’s rules ask that captions be accurate, synchronous with the speech, complete from start to end, and placed so they don’t block other important visual content. The FCC does not regulate captioning of home videos, DVDs or video games. The National Association of the Deaf notes that since 2006 all new, non-exempt, English-language television programming must be captioned.

Look-alikes

AD marks audio description, the narration of what is on screen for people who are blind or have low vision.