YouTube is one ofour favorite entertainment appson TV and on mobile, and it’s unsurprising that changes need to be tested thoroughly before they are released for the convenience of users worldwide. Before a public release, YouTube runs experiments to test upcoming changes with a small group of viewers. The newest such experiment focuses on correcting incorrectcaptions under videoswith input coming straight from viewers, à la Google Maps.
YouTube is a community-curated video platform, and is currently reliant on creator-supplied captions, or machine-generated captions. For videos that aren’t in a language you understand, the platform also has machine-generated caption translation support. However, the speech-to-text system Google uses in the background may falter due to the video presenter’s heavy accent and other variations in speech, creating incorrect captions and potentially misleading users.
Accurate captions, but not for everyone
In a recent update to theYouTube Help pagededicated to the latest test features and experiments, the developers explained viewers can watch videos on desktop with auto-generated captions switched on as a part of this experiment. If they encounter a mistake, they can suggest a correction by clicking thegear iconin the player→ Subtitles → Suggest caption corrections. It should bring up atranscriptof the video’s captions, where you may click thepencil icon, suggest the change, and hit thecheckmarkicon to submit.
While submitting corrections, you can also see submissions from other testers. To avoid duplicate suggestions and validate the accuracy of corrections, Google suggests upvoting the suggestion using thethumbs up icon. However, it’s important to note that suggested corrections won’t show up in a video for you, other testers, and users outside the experimental program immediately. YouTube forwards the suggestions to the subtitle panel visible to the video uploaders, and the onus of accepting suggestions lies on them. The same suggested corrections are visible to other testers in the Transcript panel.
For now, this YouTube experiment focuses on a small percentage of English-language channels where videos have auto-generated captions. If you’re interested in testing how this works, you need to use YouTube on a desktop through a web browser.
