• boatswain@infosec.pub
    51·
    23 hours ago

    People don’t just look at the TV for an hour straight - they are doing other things, or second-screening, or having conversations, and multiple methods being available to pick up on the show dialog is helpful.

    Wouldn’t this make subtitles less useful rather than more? You can’t see the subtitles if you’re not just looking at the TV. For second-screening, it would be more helpful to listen to the audio while you’re also scrolling Lemmy or whatever.

    • tiramichu@sh.itjust.works
      7·
      23 hours ago

      Audio and subtitles are complementary.

      If you’re having a conversation, or doing some other task that makes sound, or scrolling social media and a video starts playing, there could be a noise that momentarily covers up the audio and you miss something. If there are subs then you can quickly glance to see what was going on.

      Listening to spoken dialog allows you to look away, but subs let you catch back up if you miss something. They cover for each other.