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TV singing competition "American Idol" is all about sound. So for 28 million hearing-impaired Americans, it's a challenge just to enjoy the show. Now the National Association for the Deaf (NAD) is complaining that "Idol" made matters worse with incorrect closed captions a few weeks ago.
On its website, the organization claims it is "disappointed" that "Idol" mixed up voting phone numbers in the May 10th episode. The organization says such errors often leave "deaf and hard of hearing Americans with misinformation." Additionally, the organization has filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission, asking the Feds to crack down on sloppy closed-captions.
In a statement, The FOX Network admits that during the second round of songs in the live May 10th broadcast, the closed-caption call-in numbers were exactly the same for every contestant, skewing the voting among hearing-impaired viewers.
"If you leave one particular group out, like the hearing impaired, then you can't really call it fair," Hollywood TV director Brad Kreisberg told "CJ." He deals with closed captions on his shows and says "Idol" is much more than a contest -- it’s part of American culture.
"Everyone wants to be part of that process," Kreisberg noted. "And when you can't be, and when you're left out, it's really unfortunate, and people just take it badly."
FOX claims that although the closed-captioned numbers were wrong, the regular on-screen numbers shown during the program were correct. FOX also says people who can lip-read were able to get the right numbers that way.
But the National Association for the Deaf isn't satisfied. It wants the FCC to start fining broadcasters when their captions don't measure up.
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