Signed language public relations magazine over mobile networks

We built an electronic public relations magazine with the language medium of a signed language, and Japanese for mainly deaf people. A user can access the magazine by a mobile videophone through the Internet, and can read articles in either Japanese Sign Language (JSL) or Japanese text.

A public relations magazine has a function of providing certain information to those who live in local area. Deaf people who use a signed language in their daily life want to get information by a signed language, for example, Japanese Sign Language (JSL) in Japan. Information and communication technology (ICT) enables us to build an electronic version of the magazine, and to deliver it through the video communication networks. This report focuses on an electronic magazine over video communication networks, where deaf people can access the articles by usual mobile videophones. An experimental electronic magazine has: articles in written Japanese with simple vocabulary and sentence structure for easy understanding; and JSL explanations corresponding to the Japanese articles. We further implement a caption function for signing pictures, because a usual mobile videophone has a small display of size of around 2 inches, and the display affects the intelligibility of signing. We also make a preliminary evaluation testing with deaf people and hearing signed language interpreters. From the testing, we have found issues for further investigation: style of signing; combination of signing and text; perception of small playback signing picture; and others.

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