I'm a deaf traveler... Just passed the Platinum level yesterday, now 75,009 miles, elite plus and all that.

I've noticed that i get upgraded quite a bit into first class. That was a question I had a while back, however, the legs that I fly the most, EWR-IAH-ZLO or BWI-IAH-ZLO, or sometimes EWR-MEX-ZLO, the first leg, I get upgraded pretty much every time.

I've flown a lot (obviously) and have always wondered if it was possible for them to turn on the captions on the tv's that they have in 1st class. They do hand out those head-phones and all that, free in 1st, but i bleieve you pay for it in economy. I've never paid for them, but always wondered if it was possible for them to turn on captions to enhance the experience for us?

Maybe someone from the company is reading here... (recently saw an article in the WashPost of someone who works for CO and his job is to monitor these boards. :-)

Scubs..no. I don't think any airline would promote this differential in cabin preference due to one's handicap status.

I think it is a good option, and would be great if it was possible for the IFE system to allow captions to be turned on and off at individual seats by the passenger. However, I've never seen any such option, and it may not even be possible, as the IFE system may not be programmed to support captioning, or the tapes used in the system may not be encoded with captions. It seems like it might be something that could possibly be incorporated into future software upgrades to the new AVOD IFE system (if that system doesn't already support captioning), but I doubt that it would be something they'd add to the current systems in place on the 733s and 737-NGs, or even the current 767/777 system.

Great idea, not just for deaf flyers but for hard of hearing as well.
Ironically, I do recall seeing closed captions in the safety videos in the past.

Yeah, exactly... I didn't mean at individual seats, but for all travelers. However, would they permit that? If they all had captions, then people would be less likely to pay for the headphones if they can simply read it.

However, for the businessfirst service on international trips, where they each have individual tv's, it'd be nice to have the ability to turn them on. A lot of the programming probably is already encoded with it. Its just a matter of making sure the system has the capability to turn it on.

What could help here is noise-cancelling headphones that you can plug into the audio. It is amazing how far one has to turn down the volume when one has normal hearing. I imagine one can turn up the volume to reach many of the hard of hearing.

The screens are too small for most rows to read the captions on the 737s and 753s, at least not comfortably throughout a movie.

752s will be getting AVOD throughout the cabin.

Captions are fine for those who need them, but I certainly hope they are not there for everyone on all screens, all the time. I find them to be quite distracting. Then again, when movies with captions are shown on airplanes the captions are almost always too small for me -- and I have good eyesight. So, I'm not sure they would be too helpful if they were there.

But, might be useful (if legible) for those times when you're in a seat with broken audio.