Career Audio engineer chiming in here. I would say it’s a combination of the lack of LUFS regulation and improper mixes. IMHO dialogue clarity should be prioritized more than it currently is, or at the very least we should use the center channel in surround sound formats exclusively for dialog to make it easier to adjust(via software and/or or av receivers), at least more than we currently do. Also modern TV shows are often mixed with a high dynamic range like a movie would be(which relates to LUFS levels), kind of silly and also IMHO bad mixing practice as most of your viewers don’t have high end home theatres.

Even with places like YouTube, where LUFS level is strictly defined, there’s sooo many creators who have no earthly idea what LUFS is, which levels YouTube enforces, and how it corrects for it. They post their videos with quiet narration and wonder why viewers get annoyed at all of the turning up and turning down of volume on each video.

See, YouTube enforces LUFS on videos by reducing volume on loud videos down to -14 LUFS. But, it doesn’t do anything to quiet videos. If you ever bring up the “Stats for Nerds” and look at the “Volume / Normalized” value, you might see something like “content loudness -5.9dB”. That means it’s -5.9dB quieter than it should be, and the creator should have amplified the video to normalize the volume levels before uploading it to YouTube.

So, you end up with a video that’s about -6dB quieter, and you have to turn up the volume to actually hear the narration. Then your TV or whatever device you’re watching will get blasted by the next video, which is properly normalized at around 0dB, and you’re forced to turn the damn volume back down.

YouTube has finally started to acknowledge the problem by introducing the Stable Volume feature. But, really, creators should educate themselves on how to properly mix their audio. I know editing is hard and there’s so many moving parts to deal with for YouTube uploads. But, audio quality is everything in a YouTube video. Nobody cares about whatever random B-roll video game footage, or PowerPoint slide presentation, or watermarked stock images, or videos of you presenting the narration with a lapel mic tied to a tree branch you’re using on the video side. It’s all about narration and audio quality.

Naww dog I just don’t speak Japanese

Dynamic range and loudness normalisation are surely the main reason people are using subtitles, but habits are undeniably also changing too, as is the way people consume media in general.

People don’t just look at the TV for an hour straight - they are doing other things, or second-screening, or having conversations, and multiple methods being available to pick up on the show dialog is helpful.

Let’s not forget simple reasons like accessibility, either. My friend here in the UK is Hungarian, and despite being completely fluent in English he always likes to watch shows with subtitles as it helps with understanding some British accents which can be tricky for non-natives.

And people just process information in different ways. We’ve all heard by now that some individuals can be visually oriented, while other people are aural. If you get a choice, why not take it?

Not to mention that subs on streaming services are much better visual quality and timing than subs on broadcast TV used to be, which felt nasty and mis-timed, and very second-class. Clearly ‘good enough’ for hard of hearing individuals but not very pleasant.

I don’t think it’s a hot take to say that as accessibility features get better and more available, more people will use them. And accessibility is for everyone.

I really miss Tom Scott

As I am getting older, I think i can’t hear as well as before.

Bitter reality