Canada · Open market · Operating partnership
One citizen's case became the Accessible Canada Act.
Access on this page: Signed: American Sign Language · Langue des signes québécoise — pending How this page is tested
This page in sign language
Signed end to end by a Deaf creator, credited by name. International Sign on the global site; your national sign language on your country page.
Donna Jodhan, a blind Toronto resident, could not use her own government's websites. She sued under the Charter; in 2010 the Federal Court agreed, and in 2012 the Court of Appeal upheld it. In June 2019 Canada wrote the Accessible Canada Act: barrier-free by 2040, with ASL, LSQ and Indigenous sign languages recognised in section 5.1.
And in May 2026 the CRTC put every large streamer on a captioning clock — the whole catalogue within five years. The obligations are dated. The delivery is not yet built.
Open the conversation Skip to the partnership
Video pending
Global partner video — spoken, captioned, and signed.
The pattern
Every right, won one case at a time.
Canada recognises two sign languages — ASL and LSQ — in the Accessible Canada Act itself, alongside Indigenous sign languages. It is the structural proof of our whole thesis: there is no universal sign language. And still, access arrives case by case:
2007 Deaf Ontarians had to take six movie exhibitors and studios to the Human Rights Commission just to get captioning systems installed in cinemas — by negotiated settlement, theatre by theatre. Seed: OHRC settlement, 2007.
One pharmacy chain Blind customers won audio prescription labels at a single chain — through a human-rights complaint that binds no other pharmacy in Canada. Seed: accessibility settlement, 2016.
2040 is the deadline the Accessible Canada Act sets for a barrier-free country. The rights are written; what does not exist is anything that delivers them at scale. Seed: Accessible Canada Act, 2019.
The pattern is the market: mature rights, reactive enforcement, no delivery layer. Every win protects one service, one chain, one route — and the next denial starts from zero.
Why captions alone don't finish the job → Why Sign Language
The clock
And now Canada has deadlines.
- 2019 The Accessible Canada Act: barrier-free by 2040; ASL, LSQ, and Indigenous sign languages recognised.
- 2023 The Online Streaming Act brings streamers under CRTC jurisdiction.
- 2026 The CRTC orders qualifying streamers to caption 100% of new original programming within a year, with full catalogues phased by 2030–31 — the freshest accessibility clock in any market we track.
Every right was won one complaint at a time.
The next decade is delivery.
Delivery, built
We've seen the third act.
Where we work, Deaf and blind creators are paid to produce sign language, captions, and audio description; city governments write access into law with ally at the table — a cinema-access ordinance is past first reading; Deaf residents of Bohol have been trialing the platform in their own province; and in Singapore we ran trials with the Lighthouse and the Singapore Association for the Deaf.
And for the cinemas Deaf Ontarians fought for in 2007: our patent-pending glasses deliver the film in synchronised ASL or LSQ, captions, or audio description — every seat, both languages, no settlement required.
Your market
Now imagine 2040 arriving early.
Federal services that answer in ASL and LSQ — both, because Canada promised both.
Streamers meeting the CRTC clock with captions made by Deaf Canadians, paid for their work.
A Toronto or Montréal cinema where the 2007 fight is finally, fully finished.
Two official sign languages means two networks to organise — and the Act already wrote the deadline. Every sign language is a market someone organises first: whoever organises ASL and LSQ in Canada, keeps them.
The builder
This story needs its Canadian builder.
We bring
- The platform, the API, and the creator playbook
- The compliance-to-comprehension playbook, proven city by city
- The brand, training, and the patent-pending cinema line
You bring
- Standing in Canada — exhibition, streaming, federal services, or the Deaf community, in either language
- Operating capacity across provinces
- Market investment, and the ambition to make 2040 arrive early
A licensed market operation, built with the local community — terms discussed directly. Deaf-led organisations and entrepreneurs are explicitly welcome, in ASL and in LSQ.
More ways in
Sponsor the access
A brand underwrites signed and described content — in both of Canada's sign languages — before its competitors do.
Distribute & integrate
Streamers on the CRTC clock, broadcasters, airlines, and pharmacies carry the access through one API.
Host the first
A city or a chain stages Canada's first ASL and LSQ accessible screening day.
Invest
Back the Canadian operation alongside an operator — or introduce us to the one who should run it. Investors
Next step
Canada wrote the deadline: barrier-free by 2040. Delivery is the business.
Write to us — form, email, or a signed or spoken video message. The process: intro call → NDA → the Canada market dossier → terms.
Contact us about Canada Download the one-page Canada brief
- Are you operating in Canada today?
- Not yet. That is the point of this page.
- What does a partnership include?
- The platform, the playbook, the brand, and our team beside yours — under a licensed market structure whose terms we discuss directly.
- We're a streamer on the CRTC captioning clock — can you serve us directly?
- Yes — that is the Platform page. Meeting the clock doesn't wait for a market partner.