Friday, December 26, 2014

Why Should I Sign the Caption Smosh Petition??

We are having a tough time getting deaf and hard of hearing people to sign the petition to Smosh to caption. And no wonder!  Because Smosh does not caption, deaf and hard of hearing people are unaware of Smosh. One deaf person actually said to us, "Why should I sign??? I don't know anything about Smosh!" Of course not...because there are no captions, deaf and hard of hearing people are unaware that Smosh is a top funny YouTube channel with 19 million subscribers on their main channel, and a total of 30 million on all their channels combined. Deaf and hard of hearing people are unaware that Smosh is an award-winning channel. Deaf and hard of hearing people are unaware that Smosh is making a movie that will probably be released in summer 2015, and that features Smosh's two main actors plus a slew of other YouTube stars (none of which are captioning).



Why You Should Sign

Why should you sign even if you know nothing about Smosh and have never seen the show (some videos have been captioned by volunteers)? You should sign the Caption Smosh petition because:
  • Top YouTube shows need to somehow get the message that they need to caption!
  • Deaf and hard of hearing children and teenagers are missing out on the ability to participate in teens' chatter about Smosh on social media. If you are not a kid, sign the petition so that today's deaf and hard of hearing kids don't have to miss out! Do it for the deaf or hard of hearing kid that you used to be.
Why We Are Petitioning Smosh

Why are we petitioning Smosh? We are petitioning because it is a last resort. Nothing else we have tried has worked to get their attention! Smosh has never responded to all the people who have been asking for captions.We have tried:
  • Personal email. Failed. There's been no response to private email sent to the Smosh "contact us" emails - info@smosh.com and support@smosh.com.
  • Tweeting. Failed.
  • Facebook comments. Failed. (There's no ability to send a private message or post to the Smosh Facebook page)
  • Instagram. Failed.
  • Tumblr. Failed.
Petitioning is the only tool left for us to try! We are on the cusp of 2015, and the vast majority of the top YouTube channels are not captioning. A petition, if it has enough signatures, can get the attention of the media. A petition can go viral. A petition can be used to tell people about Smosh and the need for captions on Smosh, even if people are not on social media.

Help us get more signatures on the Caption Smosh petition - we HAVE to do something to get the top YouTube channels to closed caption! We don't know what else to do!

Sign the Petition to Smosh for Captions!

1 comment: