My friend is hard of hearing. He has problems with dialog especially when there is background music in movies. He saw “Her” when it was at the movies and got the gist of the plot, but did not really hear the dialog. I rented the movie and we watched it with subtitles and this time he got it. He was able to “see” it all.
And this got me to thinking. What if my friend had a device so that he could see the movie with subtitles. He doesn’t want a separate audio track since that would completely eliminate the music, which he can hear. But if he could have subtitles at the movies, then he could experience movies more completely and get a lot more out of each movie that he attends.
Well, Google class is too expensive at $1500, but the general notion of a second screen in your vision does fix the problem of subtitles in movies. A small, cheap – about $100 – device that would receive WiFi in the theater so patrons could see subtitles. It does not have to fit completely on the head. It could be a larger box in his pocket with a wire. And it would of course have to work for folks with glasses. Maybe for folks with glasses it’s a clip-on device that fits on their glasses. I’m sure someone could work it out.
But the theaters would have to get on-board. Does the Disabilities Act have something to say in this regard? After all it’s movies for the hearing impaired. When there are lots of theaters in a complex, we need a way to choose which movie you are watching. And if you already have Google glass, and a smart phone, then we need an app, and an understanding that Google Glass is not about piracy, its about access.
Movie Subtitle Device Described by http://www.windyweather.net/wp/2014/06/15/google-class-movie-subtitles/ is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
I have put this in the creative commons to provide prior-art in case this idea has not already been patented. And if someone has already patented this idea, then let’s release it so that folks can build it. How about some Kickstarter. I’ll bet my friend would kick in $100.
enjoy,
ww
Windy Weather 