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My name is Bob Prottas.

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I'm from Trumbull, Connecticut,
in the United States.

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I'm here at the TEDActive Conference 2015.

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I used to be a chemist
with DuPont for 27 years,

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and four years ago I retired.

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My oldest son is deaf
and he was adopted from Korea,

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and I remember watching
TV shows with him with the subtitles,

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and I thought, "You know,
it's nice having subtitles."

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I saw it as my mission
to subtitle these TED talks,

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so the deaf and hard
of hearing could see them,

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and then I learned
about the whole translation project,

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where they translate the subtitles
into other languages.

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I take an English talk
and add subtitles in English.

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Well, then they can take those subtitles

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and turn them into different languages,

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so people all over the world
can view these,

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and read them in their own language,

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which I think is pretty impressive.

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There are so many talks to choose from,

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that you've got to wonder where to start.

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And the beauty of it is,

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there's the TED organization,
which really promotes a lot.

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But then there are a lot of TEDx talks,

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and they're like pearls --
like diamonds in the rough.

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It's really pretty exciting;

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you've got this much broader audience.

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A little effort on my part goes a long way

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to make this a worldwide phenomenon.

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I like that.