Public meeting subtitles. Keep motions and outcomes separate.

Caption the approved public recording

Polyglot can help prepare local subtitles for a meeting recording that you are authorized to process and publish. Start with the version approved for the public audience and keep it linked to the meeting date, agenda revision and recording identifier. Captions represent the recording; they are not automatically approved minutes or an official account of decisions.

Confirm permission and publication rules with the responsible organization. A meeting open to attendance does not by itself resolve every reuse, privacy or distribution question. Remove excluded material in the authorized media workflow before creating public tracks. Do not upload a private section merely because it appears inside the same source recording.

Map proposals separately from outcomes

For each agenda item, note the video time where discussion begins, where a motion or amendment is stated and where an outcome is announced. Preserve the difference between proposing an action, supporting it and announcing that it passed. Never infer a decision from a show of hands that the audio does not explain.

This fictional example demonstrates a transcription error that changes the status of a proposal. It is not a real meeting record.

Illustrative agenda map
Meeting: Sample Group / A
Agenda: revision 2 / item 4

12:10: proposal introduced
14:30: amendment discussed
18:02: outcome announced

Heard: “The motion did not
carry.”
Draft: “The motion did
carry.”
Review: restore “not”.

Keep recordkeeping decisions with the organization

Check names, agenda numbers, monetary figures, negation and corrections against the recording. If a participant’s role or identity is uncertain, ask an authorized reviewer rather than assigning a name from context. Polyglot does not provide automatic speaker identification, vote counting or meeting summaries.

Robert’s Rules distinguishes minutes from a transcript of discussion. That guidance applies within its parliamentary context; the organization must determine its own applicable rules and approved record. Keep links to approved minutes separate from the subtitle track, and do not label a draft transcript as official merely because it is complete.

Have a competent language reviewer preserve the procedural meaning in translations. An amendment, recommendation and adopted decision are not interchangeable. Where a spoken announcement conflicts with a published record, refer the discrepancy to the responsible organization. Do not silently edit the captions to settle it.

Deliver usable navigation alongside captions

Export SRT or WebVTT for the archive’s actual player and check language selection, text and timing in the public-facing preview. Prepare agenda links separately using the final recording’s clock. YouTube, for example, documents manual chapters in the video description; a subtitle file does not automatically create them, and Polyglot does not publish chapter markers.

Check the first and last item, a mid-meeting break, any approved removed section and the announcement of each outcome. An edited recording needs timestamps based on the public cut, not the unedited source. Important silent slides or visual voting information may require an additional approved description.

Hand over the final recording identifier, agenda map, reviewed language tracks and links to the organization’s approved records. Retain corrections and version notes. The handoff passes when a viewer can locate the relevant discussion and read what was said without mistaking the captions for a certified decision record.

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