China · Open market · Operating partnership
Access on this page: Signed: Chinese Sign Language — 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.
ally is a platform where creators make sign language, captions and audio description — and one API delivers it to any screen. We are looking for the partner who will build the Chinese operation with us.
Why we are looking for a partner
One partner video — spoken, captioned and signed by a creator we already work with. It is shared across every open-market page. We do not fake a local signer to look established here.
The people
China's Deaf community is the largest in the world, and since 1 July 2018 it has had a national general sign language — a 5,000-sign standard produced over seven years by the State Language Commission with the disability federation and the education ministry, for use in schools and media. Regional varieties remain in daily use; the standard is the broadcast register.
In plain words
Below is who lives here and what reaches them. Every number on this page is a research seed, not an audited claim — we mark them, rather than publish numbers we cannot yet stand behind.
Why captions alone do not close this gap → Why sign language
The mandate
adopted 28 June 2023, in force 1 September 2023. Article 30: publicly funded television stations must provide synchronised subtitles and, where conditions permit, broadcast at least one sign-language news programme daily, gradually widening; the state encourages captions, sign language or audio description on published video and online programmes. Article 29: emergency information should be issued in accessible forms including sign language where conditions permit.
implemented 1 July 2018; about 5,000 standard signs after seven years of study by the State Language Commission, for use in schools and media.
the framework statute for disability rights, including information access.
Obligated buyers: publicly funded television stations under Article 30, governments issuing emergency information under Article 29, and public services under the 2023 law's information-access chapter; films and online video by encouragement only.
The gap
Chinese compliance is now statutory and narrow. Article 30 of the 2023 Barrier-free Environment Construction Law requires publicly funded television to carry synchronised subtitles and, where conditions allow, at least one signed news programme a day. Films and online video are 'encouraged' to add captions, sign language or audio description — not required. Subtitles assume reading fluency in written Chinese; the signed bulletin is one programme a day. Everything else is delivery nobody is obliged to provide.
What we bring
These are patterns, not promises — each one happened somewhere, and each carries its source. The place is abstracted because the pattern is what transposes.
Pattern
A replicable template: the ordinance language, the budget logic and the service behind it travel together. Any city can copy it.
Two city ordinances — one on healthcare accessibility, one on cinema accessibility — have passed first reading, with ally as technical partner.
Receipt: Parañaque City Council records
Pattern
The platform exists before the first contract. Buyers pay for a service, not for research.
ally's pre-operating research and development was supported by a national science research grant and a city government grant.
Receipt: company fact
Pattern
Real usage, real feedback, and the model for any school or district that wants signed content on what students already watch.
A telco-funded 2021 pilot brought the platform to a Deaf school community of about 800 users.
Receipt: company fact
We publish our signals — including the zeros — on the impact page.
The partnership
The structure is a licensed market operation, built with the local community. Terms are discussed directly.
The playbook
The partner
Operators with standing in accessibility, media, telecom, or government services. Deaf-led organisations and entrepreneurs are explicitly welcome — the best operator of an accessibility market may come from the community itself. Investors are welcome alongside an operator, or to introduce one.
Why now
The 2023 law is two years old and its 'where conditions allow' clause is being interpreted station by station. A partner who makes the daily bulletin routine, and extends the same delivery to the programmes the law only encourages, sets the pattern before the interpretations harden.
Next step
Write to us — by form, by email, or with a signed or spoken video message. From there: an introductory call, an NDA, the Chinese market dossier, then terms.
Questions