By John Eggerton, Multichannel News, 3-16-23
The Federal Communications Commission has proposed extending its audio description mandate to TV stations in all markets by 2035, unanimously approving a Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FNPRM) that would make that the case. The issue is one Chair Jessica Rosenworcel is intimately familiar with from her days on Capitol Hill.
Audio descriptions provide narration for non-dialogue scenes for the blind and visually impaired. For instance, “Fred moves to the window and sees Dino burying an odd-looking bone.”
The mandate has applied to stations in the top 60 Nielsen markets per Congress’s direction in the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010. That legislation also allows the FCC to extend the mandate to 10 more markets per year unless the cost of doing so for smaller markets is not “reasonable.” » Read More