Meeting minutes
This meeting
Nigel: There are only 3 of us present, and the agenda is very light.
… Given who is here we could actually discuss TPAC planning and the
… MEIG proposal for gathering additional requirements for timed text, that I
… distributed on member-tt just over an hour ago.
… (it's only short)
Chris: I'm happy to talk about those.
Nigel: Anything else for the agenda?
nothing more
MEIG proposal for a task force to gather future timed text requirements
Nigel: I sent the proposal to member-tt
Proposal (member-only visible)
Nigel: I wrote a short document to describe what we want to do, including scope and time limits
… [Reads through the proposal]
Chris: A few things. You talk about the use of AI or machine analysis to capture more data,
… and then being able to represent that in timed text formats.
… Do we also need to consider how that is used or rendered?
… How does an end user consuming those files experience the extra data, in the way
… that e.g. TTML defines a rendering model?
Nigel: Yes, the two key parts are capturing richer data, in a cost effective way, then having presentation semantics
… It may be that the existing presentation semantics are good enough, and you just need to define, for example, when "anger" or "happy" is conveyed, to change the presentation in a particular way
… I want to make sure we caveat that assigning motive to a speaker is challenging, and error-prone. So no expectation of 100% accuracy
… There are companies doing something here. One I've talked to is amenable to standardisation of capturing and expressing the data
… The mapping from that expression into presentation might not need to be standardised and could be part of the content provider's presentation
… Or let the client handle it in differently
Chris: The proposal should definitely cover this.
Chris: MEIG is a member interest group. W3C has two kinds of IG, those that are members
… and those that allow non-member participants.
… MEIG is in the former category. As the Chair I tend to invite guests.
… I want to enable this task force to happen.
… Provided the Team are comfortable with it we might operate it on a flexible
… participation basis.
Nigel: I see this as almost a Wide Review exercise, in which the task force can seek
… input from members and non-members, either in written form or verbally.
… That doesn't make the task force suddenly open the MEIG to non-members.
… Even WGs can seek wide review, and are expected to.
Nigel: So actions for the proposal:
… * clarify that presentation semantics could be in scope
… * clarify that we want to seek input broadly
Chris: Ok, that handles the structure that we can use.
… Follow-on question: how to build that group of participants.
… Do you think we'll be able to get a good set of participants to drive the work?
… Can MEIG help with that part?
… Are there liaison groups that we would want to raise this to? What kind of outreach is needed?
Nigel: Yes, I'd hope that some TTWG and MEIG members would be interested to participate, and I'd look to them initially
… I'm fairly sure we could get input from others. The Motion Picture Academy ran an expressive captioning summit earlier in the year, and there's another coming up
… I can say we're running a TF to gather requirements, I wouldn't be surprised if there's interest
… I know two organisations in particular who are creating products
Chris: Kick off at TPAC?
Nigel: I can do another iteration of the document, share with MEIG, possibly start sooner. If we do that, we could have a session at TPAC
… A breakout there could be good
Nigel: One of the concerns that one TTWG member raised is that starting a TF to gather requirements sounds like a bureaucratic exercise, not attractive
… So I want to emphasis that it's a lightweight, speedy thing
… The output should be a document, but I don't want to spend lots of time wrangling words
Chris: Do a gap analysis of what existing formats like EmotionML support?
Nigel: Yes, do as much as possible offline
… That might support a lot of what's needed. From a presentation perspective, there's varying how the text appears. Uses existing CSS support, but the animation might be trickier
… TTML supports continuous animation (that's not in IMSC). Doing it upfront may lead it to something very verbose
… Today's solutions include sending things like animated GIF
… There's good audience benefits. There are accessibility concerns, I should capture those in the document
Nigel: What's the next step? I can refine the proposal, then what?
Chris: Add to the MEIG GitHub? That's reflected to the public mailing list
Chris: I can add it to the agenda for the August 4 MEIG meeting
TPAC schedule
Nigel: I think this is OK, any comments?
Chris: I think it's fine, we just need to prepare the agendas
Nigel: I need to create a TTWG issue, and add a page to the wiki
Chris: I've already done that for MEIG and Media WG. There's nothing in it yet,
… just a skeleton of the times and things to fill in.
… I can cross-link from that to a TTWG issue or wiki page.
Nigel: Great.
Chris: w3c/
Meeting Close
Nigel: Thanks everyone, we've covered our agenda, let's adjourn.
… Next meeting on 2026-07-30 w3c/
… [adjourns meeting]