Banjo's World

Equal Access: Netflix
Banjo's World Before I begin, I want you to know that I am not a subscriber to any of Netflix's services. There are several reasons why. The main reason for this is due to the lack of accessibility available on their streaming services. Over the years, I have read quite a bit about Netflix. Years ago, they announced their plans to set up a big streaming service. They were warned on...
Tue, Oct 11 2011

Equal Access: YouTube
Banjo's World You know what the great thing about YouTube is? It's the fact that we are able to caption any of our video contents in any language we wish to. We all love closed captioning, don't we? It makes everything so much easier to understand.Only if that was true. Well, at least for the most part of it anyway. There are so many well-known brands who use YouTube to their advan...
Sun, Oct 09 2011

Wonderstruck: A Sneak Peek
Banjo's World A few days ago, I wrote a non-spoiler review on Brian Selznick's new novel, "Wonderstruck". As you know, the novel is about two deaf individuals living in two different time periods. One in 1927 and the other in 1977.Here is a YouTube video clip giving you a sneak peek at the new novel. It is also closed captioned for the deaf viewers. Enjoy!
Sun, Oct 02 2011

Wonderstruck!
Banjo's World Howdy readers, how's it going? What about me? Things are good, thank you for asking. Anyway, I'm not here to talk about myself. I just want to let all of you know about a new novel that came out recently. It's called, "Wonderstruck". Trust me, this is a book that you may be interested in, especially if you happen to be deaf."Wonderstruck" Book CoverThe autho...
Mon, Sep 26 2011

d/Deaf and d/Dumb
Banjo's World A while ago, I came across a book titled, "d/Deaf and d/Dumb: A Portrait of a Deaf Kid as a Young Superhero". I don't often read books like the one I just mentioned. However, the reason why I decided to give this one a shot was because this was put under the category of Disability Studies in Education. The book was written by Joseph Michael Valente. He is an Assistant...
Wed, Jul 06 2011

Rude Advocates? Access Denied!
Banjo's World Today, I was reading an article on how the advocates for the deaf are putting the pressure on video producers to add closed captions. We do need advocates to break down the barriers for us. Although what caught my attention was one of the comments below the article.Xyasis wrote: This woman is rude. I have first hand experience with this activist. We just released a sh...
Mon, Jul 04 2011

Interpreters' Code of Ethics Violation on CSI: LV
Banjo's World My wife and I watched an episode of CSI: Las Veags last night. It guest-starred quite a few deaf actors including Marlee Matlin, Phyllis Frelich, Tyrone Giordano, Anthony Natale and more.It was a decent episode, we both enjoyed it. Just a spoiler alert in case you haven't watched the episode.It was somewhat of an interesting twist that it was an interpreter who murder...
Fri, Feb 04 2011

Childhood Abuse Higher Among the Deaf
Banjo's World Recently, I came across an article I found to be interesting. It's about a study focused on neglect or abuse among the deaf population. You might find this interesting too.Deaf and hard-of-hearing college students experienced more childhood neglect or abuse than their hearing peers, according to research at Rochester Institute of Technology.In a study of 425 students ...
Wed, Jan 19 2011

Our Wedding Highlights
Banjo's World Howdy, I know it has been more than a good while since I said something. That's how busy I have been. As you may recall in my last blog update, I mentioned that I was getting married in November.It was a fine day to remember. My wife and I will never forget the day. For all of our guests, it was truly a memorable day. It was a big day in the making for over a year.We ...
Mon, Jan 10 2011

Closed Captioning Bill for Online TV
Banjo's World Here's the article. It was published yesterday. As you may remember, the House passed the bill back in July. Afterward, a minor amendment was made to the bill, the Senate passed it last week. President Obama is expected to sign or veto the bill within two weeks, I'm pretty sure he'll sign it though.They had to start somewhere. Baby steps, that's how I see it. They are...
Fri, Oct 01 2010

Just Keeping Things Fresh, Not Stale
Banjo's World I just wanted to say something today regarding my blogging style. Well, it's more of an editorial decision.There is one thing I cannot stand, it's repetition. There is one topic that is famous for that. It's politics. My blog isn't even about politics to start with. I have decided it's for the best to keep politics to a minimum, meaning I won't be blogging on it at al...
Fri, Sep 24 2010

Fox... What's The Deal?
Banjo's World On several occasions, I blogged on the lack of access on a good number of DVDs and Blu-ray. Especially the special features. I named a few offenders such as Sony (Columbia/Tri-Star), Warner Bros., Fox, MGM, etc.A while ago, I had a conversation with a friend regarding the special features on DVDs and Blu-ray. He mentioned that he would buy movies from Europe as long t...
Wed, Sep 22 2010

I'm Still Here
Banjo's World Howdy everyone, especially to my old readers if they are still around. The title says it all. I'm still here, it's just different this time.So much has happened in the last couple years since I retired from the blogosphere. Since then, I had lost interest in blogging. Although I do tweet once in a while. It's not the same though. The spark isn't just there anymore. No...
Fri, Sep 17 2010

Okay... One More Response to the Commenters on CBC.ca
Banjo's World Yep, I wrote another response on the CBC.ca article regarding the CRTC decision on accessibility for the deaf and blind Canadians. You can read the article here.cle492001ca wrote:"I heard his sense of smell was stronger because of the loss of his hearing. If there were fire, he would probably be the first to know about it. Very frugal."You may be surprised to learn of...
Fri, Jul 24 2009

Another Response to the Commenters on CBC.ca
Banjo's World I wrote another comment in response to even more ignorant comments that was left on the CBC.ca article that I mentioned last night. You can read the article here.Below is the second comment I left on the website.Deaf and blind Canadians are responsible for paying for pretty much everything on their own. Hearing aids, fire alarms, doorbells and such that are equipped f...
Wed, Jul 22 2009

A Response to the Commenters on CBC.ca
Banjo's World Here is a bit of blogging of mine. I just had to blog on this matter because it is important for the deaf Canadians and the Canadians with disabilities to become aware of the ignorance toward us from the public. It's not a laughing matter when people are set to oppress any motions to mandate better accessibility for the deaf and the other Canadians with disabilities.T...
Wed, Jul 22 2009

Banjo Says Goodbye...
Banjo's World My fellow readers, as all of you have noticed, I haven't blogged or vlogged in a good while. My last entry was back in September.My life has changed quite a lot in the last few months for the better. I loved blogging and vlogging, however I am finding it more difficult to focus any time on my blog these days. I have shifted my focus onto other things in my life. I enj...
Sat, Dec 20 2008

Equal Access: HDMI is Inaccessible
Banjo's World Hello everybody, I'm glad to be back here after a lengthy vacation. I finally decided on a subject to cover. I feel that it is quite a serious situation. Please watch the vlog to learn why it concerns the deaf community in a big way. The vlog is captioned. After watching the vlog, I hope you are now more aware of how serious this situation is becoming. The HDMI is bec...
Sun, Sep 28 2008

Deaf Village, How About A Compromise?
Banjo's World The new blog aggregator, Deaf Village is the featured topic in this vlog. It is captioned in English for people who are not fluent in ASL (American Sign Language). In hope for a compromise, I decided to propose a solution to this situation. It has been on my mind for the last few days. Basically, it may be the only true way of promoting inclusivity of all people from ...
Fri, Jun 20 2008

Comparing Deafread and Deaf Village's Guidelines
Banjo's World There is an ongoing controversy involving DeafRead and Deaf Village, the new blog aggregator for the deaf and hard of hearing bloggers and vloggers. People gave birth to Deaf Village out of spite to DeafRead over due to the dispute concerning their policies. They felt that DeafRead was being unfair to them. The removal of Cochlear Implant Online was the final straw. I...
Sat, Jun 14 2008

Deaf Priests Vs. Castle Hills, Texas
Banjo's World Yesterday, a group of deaf priests successfully won a fight with the city hall in acquiring the permit to run a seminary. The residents of Castle Hills protested the seminary out of fear that it may open up the door to group homes and fraternities.The seminary will be on an 8,100 square-foot-house. I think I can understand why some may be concerned about the idea of f...
Wed, Jun 11 2008

Oh The Drama!
Banjo's World I'm not going to make a big of commentary out of this. As many of you may know, it was brought to everybody's attention that the DeafRead team had decided to stop publishing blog entries from Cochlear Implant Online over allegations of Rachel Chaikof failing to disclose that Cochlear Awareness Network (CAN) is owned by Cochlear Americas. The DeafRead team was aware of...
Mon, Jun 09 2008

Sorenson, Shame on You!
Banjo's World Sorenson, shame on you!Shame on you!The provincial government of British Columbia, shame on you!Shame on you!The federal government of Canada, shame on you!Shame on you!Some of you may have heard by now, Sorenson set up a VRS (Video Relay Service) call centre in Burnaby, British Columbia. It is a province right above the state of Washington. Some of you may think that...
Mon, May 19 2008

Faces of Captioning...
Banjo's World VITAC, a leader in closed captioning in America recently launched a new campaign to heighten awareness of the impact of captions have on many people. It is called CaptionsON. Below is what they had to say on the subject of why captions matter.Captions matter because captions are…Free to viewers of television and the Internet.Accessible to individuals living in nearly ...
Wed, May 14 2008

Welcome to Banjosworld.com!
Banjo's World Yep, I finally bought my own domain. I also decided to change the template of my blog. For these who have me on the blogroll, you may have to change the web address from my old address to banjosworld.com.I don't have much to blog about at the moment. I just wanted to let everybody know about the change here at Banjo's World.Have a great day!
Fri, Apr 25 2008 · Moved from DeafRead Extra

Sweet Nothing In My Ear: A Movie Review
Banjo's World Some of you may have watched the movie earlier tonight on CBS. If you haven't watched the movie and don’t want to read anything spoiling the movie; Then I suggest that you hold yourself back from reading this. Also, I have to emphasize that this blog entry is not about the cochlear implants. It is about the movie and what I thought of it.Jeff Daniels and Marlee Matlin...
Mon, Apr 21 2008

Captioning Sucks!
Banjo's World It's a good website to check out. They tell you all of the problems associated with captioning and more. As I mentioned earlier today about captioning issues with HDTV and high-definition media/video players such as Blu-ray and HDTV receivers.They will tell you what you need to know and have the sources to back it up. It is amazing how much power the corporations wiel...
Sun, Apr 13 2008

PS3 & Blu-ray Players: Why Closed Captioning is Necessary
Banjo's World The HDMI cable, it is a wonderful thing to have. It can carry the 1080p signal bringing you true high-definition video and audio quality. The bad news is that there are drawbacks. The cable itself is only able to transmit a video signal and an audio signal simultaneously.What this means is that you cannot put any other signal through a HDMI cable because it will not b...
Sun, Apr 13 2008

Hear and Now: An Intriguing Documentary?
Banjo's World The other day, I stumbled onto a preview for an upcoming documentary that was recently screened at the Sundance Film Festival. It won an award. It is about a deaf couple in their sixties. They get cochlear implants together. The interesting part is that they are both fluent in ASL (American Sign Language). As you know, it is still controversial to even speak of cochle...
Wed, Apr 09 2008

Raychelle is an Asset to the Deaf Community
Banjo's World Raychelle is a deaf v/blogger. Her blogger is named Rays of Raychelle. She has an excellent command on both languages of ASL and English. What makes her different from many ASL vloggers is the fact that she has a cochlear implant. Unfortunately, it also makes her a target.What I am about to say may generate some heat. However, I will not just sit here and say nothing ...
Fri, Mar 21 2008

Happy Birthday Project readOn!
Banjo's World Project readOn just turned a year old. They already made an impact on the internet over the year. If you ask me, I think it's quite an achievement on what they have done so far. I command them for doing a great job.As a part of the celebration, you are now able to embed any captioned video from Projectreadon.com on your blog. Just like you can with YouTube and Google ...
Fri, Mar 21 2008

Want to Chat with Banjo?
Banjo's World Hello Bluegrassers! Yes, that's what I'm going to call all of my readers from now on.Bluegrassers!Bluegrass is a form of American roots music strongly influenced by Irish, Scottish and English traditional music. Banjo is a common musical instrument used for Bluegrass music. Makes sense to call all of you that, doesn't it?It was LaRonda of "The Ear of My Heart", who ma...
Fri, Mar 14 2008 · Moved from DeafRead Extra

Banjo's Thoughts on Jericho
Banjo's World In this vlog, I discuss the episode of Jericho that was aired on CBS on Tuesday, March 4, 2008. The vlog is captioned for these who are not fluent in American Sign Language. For these who prefer to watch ASL vlogs without subtitles, you can disable it by clicking onto the “CC” icon.I am looking forward to what all of you have to say regarding the recent episode of Jer...
Sun, Mar 09 2008

Ding Dong, the HD DVD Format is Dead
Banjo's World That's right, the HD DVD format is now officially dead as of today. Toshiba, the biggest backer of HD DVD announced today they are dropping the format due to the declining sales in both hardware and software. Ever since Warner Bros. Entertainment announced they were going to support Blu-ray exclusively back in early January, it resulted in a massive domino effect. New...
Tue, Feb 19 2008 · Moved from DeafRead Extra

Open Captioning: Why We Need It
Banjo's World In a recent e-mail I received, the person mentioned that he is working with the local deaf community to organize events at the theatre. He is trying to get a V.I.P. -type program set up for the deaf and hard of hearing moviegoers so it would be easier to show open-captioned movies instead of using the RWC system. I must say he's one heck of a guy because of his dedica...
Fri, Feb 15 2008

Should We Subtitle Our Vlogs?
Banjo's World I am sure a number of readers are tired of reading about subtitles in our vlogs. Though I still want to do a poll and see what the average reader think. There are two polls below. surveys - Take Our Poll surveys - Take Our Poll For the last week, there was a surge in the discussion of whether we should subtitle our vlogs or not. As you know, I do subtitle most of my ...
Thu, Feb 14 2008

Jericho returns to TV tonight!
Banjo's World For these who are fans and are looking forward to the second season premiere of TV show, "Jericho." I just wanted to give out a reminder that it is airing tonight.There will be only seven episodes this season since it was a last-minute production due to the setbacks as caused by the cancellation back in May. They shot two different endings for the season finale. One e...
Tue, Feb 12 2008

The Forest: An Animated ASL Story
Banjo's World This is a pretty cool one. It's an ASL story being told by a computer-generated person. I don't believe I have ever seen one this well done. Yes, the body model itself could be more realistic but that's not the point. The animated character features body movements, the facial expressions, the ASL classifiers and more. This is where they really excelled in. Vcom3D and...
Fri, Feb 08 2008

Super Bowl Ad Rankings
Banjo's World I decided to browse the internet for the reactions to "Bob's House", which aired during the pre-game event yesterday. I came across this article. Just take a look and I think you will be pleased to see how it turned out.Entertainment Score RankingsAds ranked based on their ability to entertain viewers. The top entertaining ads starting with best were: IRONMAN, Pepsi (...
Mon, Feb 04 2008

Captioned Superbowl Ads!
Banjo's World As many of you may be aware of, they don't often caption or subtitle TV advertisements online for the deaf and hard of hearing. That was always the case with Superbowl ads ever since they started airing them online on a yearly basis following the Super Bowl event.Today, that is no longer the case. I received an e-mail from John Erskine, the co-founder of ProjectReadon...
Mon, Feb 04 2008

Rock Band: A Game For Everybody!
Banjo's World If you think about it, the deaf people wouldn't think a game like "Rock Band" or "Guitar Hero" and such types of games would appeal to them. The hearing people would think the same about the deaf people. I know because I have gotten asked questions from some of the hearing people I know.Well, you may be surprised to find out how wrong you would be. Rock Band is really...
Sun, Jan 20 2008

Jericho: Tick Tick Boom Preview - Captioned
Banjo's World Earlier today, I wrote that Shoshannah Stern would be in the second season of "Jericho." I also posted a link to the video clip at the official website. Though it wasn't captioned.Now, I want to thank Bill Creswell for captioning the video. A few days ago, I mentioned how he is working to caption as many movie trailers as he can free of charge. We shouldn't take it fo...
Wed, Jan 02 2008

Shoshannah Stern Stays in Jericho
Banjo's World As some of you know, the show, Jericho will be returning on February 12. The last time I covered the subject, I was unsure if Shoshannah Stern, the deaf actress, would be involved with the second season or not.Today, I took a look at a video clip promoting the show on the official "Jericho" website. I was able to spot Shoshannah Stern in a few shots meaning she is sti...
Tue, Jan 01 2008

More Captioned Movie Trailers!
Banjo's World Thanks to Bill Creswell who responded to my recent blog entry, "Captioned Movie Trailers!" He gave me a web address leading to a website titled, "Subtitled Movie Trailers!" Click here to check it out!They have over 100 trailers that are subtitled. I checked some of them out. The subtitles appear to be burnt in with the movie. Unlikely Bill Creswell's captioned trailer...
Mon, Dec 31 2007

Captioned Movie Trailers!
Banjo's World Bill Creswell, a web developer who works for a theatre that provides closed captioning and descriptive audio. He first contacted me earlier this year in response to my captioned vlogs and asked how I did it. I shared some information with him regarding captioning video clips.I must say I am pleased with what he has done so far. The reason why he wanted my help in the ...
Mon, Dec 31 2007

Senator Tom Harkin Partners with ProjectReadOn.com
Banjo's World Today, I was sent an e-mail from the founder of ProjectReadOn.com, Mateo Gutierrez. I was pleased to learn that a politician actually took the time to partner up with Mateo to provide closed captioning of web video for the deaf and hard of hearing internet users. Here's the press release that was issued.Tuesday, December 4, 2007Press Release TOMHARKIN.COM PARTNERS WIT...
Tue, Dec 11 2007

Jericho Returns on February 12, 2008
Banjo's World I know I haven't been writing for my blog in the last couple months. I don't expect to write on a frequent basis this month, as it will be a very busy month.Now, let's get to the good news. According to Variety, "Jericho" will return on February 12. It will be replacing the recently cancelled TV series, "Cane". It will be airing at 10:00pm, ET/PT.As some of you may re...
Tue, Dec 04 2007

What's Wrong With This Picture?
Banjo's World Earlier this week, I went to Wal-Mart. I was browsing through the DVD racks and I came across a DVD. It grabbed my attention because of the cyan colour taking up the whole cover with a simple logo in the middle. Then I took a closer look. I was taken off guard by what I just had read. I had to read at least a few times to make sure I wasn't seeing things. Apparently ...
Sun, Oct 21 2007

The Influence of Marcel Marceau
Banjo's World
Mon, Sep 24 2007

Cochlear Implants: A Wedding Sermon
Banjo's World In this vlog, I decided to bring up a subject of something that occurred at a wedding ceremony a few weeks ago. It was a deaf couple's wedding; the bride is a good friend of mine. I've known her for many years. She is Polish and most of the family members at the wedding were Polish and many were born in Poland. In my city, they have a strong Polish community and many [...]
Sun, Sep 16 2007