B) Captioning Services for Repeats of Television Programs

ATTACHMENT A b) Captioning services for repeats of television programs i. Did you comply with the requirement under s.130ZZ to provide a captioning service for each television program that had previously been transmitted with captions on the same subscription television channel or any subscription television service provided by you? (Yes/No/Not applicable)

II If no, please indicate which channels did not meet this requirement and provide details. If you consider non-compliance was caused by unforeseen significant technical / engineering difficulties (s130ZZAB), please provide reasons

Subject to the disclosures below, we confirm Foxtel’s compliance with s130ZZ to the best of our knowledge, having made reasonable enquiries. The enquiries that Foxtel has made are as follows:

1. We have requested each captioning channel group on the Foxtel platform to confirm compliance with s130ZZ within their channel group as part of their annual reporting to Foxtel on captioning compliance and captioning targets.

2. We have reviewed all Foxtel customer captioning complaint records for the financial year and analysed any instances where an identified captioning error was to a program “repeat”.

3. We have reviewed our technical incidents logs to identify any additional captioning issues that were not identified throughout complaints records.

From this analysis, Foxtel is aware of a number of incidents where channels did not meet the requirement under s130ZZ. These incidents are disclosed below.

Disclosures:

NBCU moved the play-out of the Universal channel from Foxtel to Globecast Singapore on 31 December 2013, and launched a new channel, SyFy, on 1 January 2014. SyFy was also played out by Globecast Singapore. Due to the play-out change and launch of the new SyFy channel, 2 repeat incidents were identified by NBCU. These were caused by constraints due to the switchover and launch of a new channel which impacted operational captioning processes. They were not capable of remedy in the timeframe. They are set out below.

CHANNEL: SyFy Programs: Warehouse 13 – Season 1, Ep 1 Hollywood Treasure Season 1, Ep 3

On the 30th December, NBCU notified Foxtel of a captioning content issue which would prevent SyFy transmitting captions on 2 programs that had previously been transmitted on the SciFi channel with captions. The content issue occurred due to time constraints just prior to launch of the new channel. The issue was rectified shortly after launch of the channel on 3 January 2014.

The following episodes were affected: Warehouse 13 – Season 1, Ep 1, 4:30pm, 1 January 2014 Hollywood Treasure – Season 1, Ep 3, 2pm, 3 January 2014 CHANNEL: Universal Programs: Law & Order: Criminal Intent - Season 8, Ep 1 and 2 Flashpoint – Season 1, Ep 1 and 3

On the 30th December, Universal advised Foxtel of a captioning content issue which would prevent Universal from transmitting captions on two episodes of Law & Order: CI and two episodes of Flashpoint that had previously been transmitted on the channel with captions. The content issue occurred as a result of Universal moving its play out to Singapore, and encountering time constraints in completing captioning in time for the channel’s switchover. This issue was rectified shortly after launch of the new play out location on 3 January 2014.

The following episodes were affected: Law & Order: Criminal Intent – Season 8, Ep 1, 6:30pm, 1 January 2014 Law & Order: Criminal Intent – Season 8, Ep 2, 6.30pm, 2 January 2014 Flashpoint – Season 1, Ep 1, 5.30pm, 1 January 2014 Flashpoint – Season 1, Ep 3, 5.30pm, 3 January 2014 CHANNEL: SyFy and Universal Programs: Various programs

Due to unforeseen technical problems when the new NBCU play-out infrastructure went live, a number of other issues arose in relation to the broadcast of some repeat programming during the period 1 January – 17 January (Period). These issues did not lead to a failure to meet the captioning targets required by the Universal and SyFy channels. Play-out of the 13th Street channel was moved from Foxtel to Globecast Singapore on 1 April 2014 without issue.

A summary of the issue, and action taken by Foxtel and NBCU (through its service provider Globecast Singapore) is set out below.

Prior to switchover to transmission of the Universal channel, and launch of the SyFy channel, from the Singapore play-out, captioning was tested on the transmission paths and was being received correctly. After switchover on 1 January 2014, we believe that captioning was broadcast correctly during the Period. However since our Mediaproxy compliance system was not fully functioning until 17 February 2014, we do not have copies of recordings to demonstrate this. We did, however, become aware that captions were not being received in certain customer premise equipment. After extensive investigation between Foxtel and Globecast Singapore, it was discovered that there was a captioning configuration issue on the new incoming path from Singapore, whereby an obscure “inhibit captions” flag was found to be enabled on the caption data preventing captions from being received by certain customer premise equipment.

This technical issue was corrected on 17 January 2014. In response to this issue, Foxtel has undertaken to check that on launch of any new channel path, the caption data stream is checked to ensure that it is being received correctly on customer premise equipment. We believe this may have affected all captioned programing on SyFy and Universal being received by certain customer premise equipment between 1 January 2014 and 17 January 2014.

Pursuant to section 130ZZAB, Foxtel considers that this breach was attributable to significant difficulties of a technical nature that could not reasonably have been foreseen by Foxtel. The problem was caused by a captioning configuration issue on the new incoming path from Singapore. We believe that the problem was due to incorrect configuration by Globecast Singapore. Foxtel had never encountered this type of issue with any previous external channel launches, and is not aware of this error occurring before or since. For future channel launches, captioning testing will include testing of the captioning path through to the customer premise equipment to prevent this error occurring again.

CHANNEL: ESPN 2 (SD/HD) Program: Various programs

ESPN2 channel is not a caption enabled channel. Following a platform reconciliation on 27 September 2013, it became apparent that certain content that had previously been transmitted on ESPN (SD) with captions was repeated on ESPN2 (SD/HD) without captions. In order to rectify this issue, ESPN2 needs to be caption enabled. Foxtel has been working with ESPN to change the configuration of the channel so that captions will be enabled on ESPN2. Enabling captions on ESPN2 has required a significant equipment investment from ESPN, and a number of technical issues have occurred in the implementation. On 30 July 2014, ESPN2 began broadcasting captions however significant quality issues were experienced including intermittent garbling, issues with caption locations and letter drop off. Foxtel and ESPN engineers have been working together to resolve these issues as quickly as possible. The garbling issues were resolved on August 19 however further issues appeared including the inclusion of Spanish captions and captioning appearing over active video. Foxtel requested that ESPN turn off the captions until all issues could be addressed. The ESPN engineering team have advised that the problems have primarily arisen due to issues in the implementation of the translation equipment which is required to translate the US captions to meet the Australian standard. This has required an engineering redesign and rebuild of the ESPN distribution paths. Currently, we anticipate that the issues in the reconfiguration will be complete in early October, and subject to successful testing, ESPN2 will be caption enabled from this date.

CHANNEL: SciFi Program: Stargate – Season 3, Ep 5, 8, 12, and 15

Four episodes of Stargate were recalled by the channel for adjustment. When the same tapes were sent back to Foxtel and re-ingested with new IDs, they did not ingest with captions. We believe that the tapes did not re-ingest with captions due to a faulty or misconfigured deck. Once identified, all four tapes were re-ingested correctly with captions. As a result of this error, the Content Preparation Operators have been retrained on the re-ingest process to ensure that the top and tail is completed; confirming that captions are present on all re-ingestions.

The error affected the following airings:

Season 3, Episode 5: 22 July 2013 6.30am, 4.30pm, 11.30pm Season 3, Episode 8: 25 July 2013 6.30am, 4.30pm, 11.30pm Season 3, Episode 12: 31 July 2013 6.30am, 4.30pm, 11.30pm Season 3, Episode 15: 5 August 2013 6.30am, 4.30pm, 11.30pm

CHANNEL: FOX FOOTY Program: On the Couch, Ep 3, 26 March 2014

As the ACMA is aware, FOX SPORTS Australia (FSA), the producer and supplier of FOX SPORTS 1, 2 and 3, FOX FOOTY, FUEL TV and SPEED, has been working throughout the 2013-14 financial year to implement a solution which will enable it to re-use live captions for repeats of programs which were first broadcast with captions on a live basis. Further information regarding the implementation of the solution is included in Attachment D. Until such time as FSA implements a solution to re-use live captions, the only way for FSA to provide captions for a repeat of a program which was first broadcast with captions on a live basis is to procure live captions for each repeat. FSA procured its live captioning provider, Ai-Media, to provide live captions for the initial broadcast of episode 3 of On the Couch on FOX FOOTY on 24 March 2014. The same episode was repeated on 25 March 2014 and FSA also procured Ai-Media to provide live captions for that repeat. FSA’s Manager – FOX SPORTS Programming then removed subsequent repeats of the episode from the FOX FOOTY schedule due to the costs of procuring live captions for each repeat. Due to a human error, a member of the FOX SPORTS Programming department scheduled another repeat of the episode for broadcast on 26 March 2014. The Programming Manager did not become aware of this until after the repeat had been broadcast, and was therefore unable to procure live captions for the repeat. The Programming Manager promptly ensured that no further repeats of the episode were broadcast.

CHANNEL: SPEED Program: United Sportscar Championship 2014 (Sebring 12 hour) – 19 March 2014

As noted above, until such time as FSA implements a solution to re-use live captions, the only way for FSA to provide captions for a repeat of a program which was first broadcast with captions on a live basis is to procure live captions for each repeat.

FSA procured its live captioning provider, Ai-Media, to provide live captions for the initial broadcast of United Sportscar Championships 2014 (Sebring 12 hour) on 16 March 2014. The program was repeated on 17 and 19 March 2014 and FSA also procured Ai-Media to provide live captions for those repeats. However, Ai-Media advised FSA that the repeat on 19 March 2014 was not captioned due to human error by the captioner. The captioner misread the start time for the booking and therefore did not caption the program.

CHANNEL: FOX SPORTS 1 Program: Queensland Cup Round 11 – 17 May 2014

As noted above, until such time as FSA implements a solution to re-use live captions, the only way for FSA to provide captions for a repeat of a program which was first broadcast with captions on a live basis is to procure live captions for each repeat.

FSA procured its live captioning provider, Ai-Media, to provide live captions for the initial broadcast of Queensland Cup Round 11 on 14 May 2014. The same program was repeated on 17 May 2014 and FSA also procured Ai-Media to provide live captions for that repeat. However, Ai-Media advised FSA that the repeat was not captioned due to human error by the captioner. The captioner misread the roster and therefore did not attend their shift at the correct time.

FSA has discussed the above two issues with Ai-Media. Ai-Media has reviewed its internal processes to prevent similar issues from occurring in future, including by implementing the following measures:

- SMS alert: if a captioner has not logged on for a shift, they will receive an SMS alert; and

- Ai-Media workflow system: if a captioner has not logged on for a shift out of hours, the 24-hour broadcast help desk will receive a notification to prevent the shift from being missed.

CHANNELS: MTV Dance and MTV Music Program: Various Programs In December 2013 VIMN moved the transmission of their channels from Sydney to London. This was a significant technical and operational undertaking which required the implementation of new systems, workflows and processes.

While the transition as a whole has been successful it did give rise to certain technical issues which impacted the transmission of closed captions on the MTV Music and MTV Dance channels.

On 3 July 2014 Foxtel notified VIMN’s channel operations team that it was unable to detect closed captions on the MTV Music and MTV Dance channels. VIMN confirmed with the London Media Centre (LMC) that captions were leaving the LMC correctly for MTV Music and MTV Dance, and requested that Foxtel contact VIMN’s Australian service provider (Globecast). Globecast identified that the issue was due to an equipment problem at its Sydney premises. Globecast receives the channel signals in Sydney by fibre from the LMC. The signals are then relayed to Foxtel. A decoder in the relay chain for MTV Music and MTV Dance was identified as failing to relay the closed captions. The issue was resolved by Globecast within approximately 65 minutes of receiving notification.

Further investigations by Foxtel showed that the issue had been occurring since 25 May 2014. VIMN requested that Globecast undertake similar analysis. Globecast was able to confirm that when maintenance was last carried out on the decoders on 4 March 2014 there were no issues with captions on MTV Music and MTV Dance. However, Globecast was unable to confirm that captions had been transmitted on MTV Music and MTV Dance at all times between 4 March 2014 and 25 May 2014.

We know that closed captions were not transmitted on MTV Music and MTV Dance between 25 May 2014 and 3 July 2014. We also recognise that there is a risk that closed captions were not transmitted on MTV Music and MTV Dance between 4 March 2014 and 25 May 2014. As at 4 March 2014 MTV Music and MTV Dance had reached the required closed captions target for the 12 months ending 30 June 2014. However, for the period from 4 March 2014 to 3 July 2014, VIMN may not have met all of its obligations to transmit closed captions in repeat broadcasts of programmes that were initially broadcast with closed captions.

Since 3 July 2014, VIMN has directed Globecast to undertake daily manual monitoring of all VIMN channels to ensure closed captions are being transmitted. VIMN and Globecast have also implemented additional data trapping and alarming within the channel transmission architecture to ensure any loss of closed captions is identified and rectified as soon as possible. In addition, Foxtel has implemented additional spot-checking of captioning across the platform by its National Operations Centre, and is working with MTV to ensure that the caption schedule for the music channels is provided in advance to enable spot-checking. These mitigation strategies should ensure that future issues of this nature are limited in duration.