Burning subs into a video is easily done with a ffmpeg one-liner (using its "libass" renderer or whatever). (Someone nontechnical may need help putting together that oneliner, but after that it's just repetition.) It's generally a bad idea; don't hard sub if you can avoid it and make the video available without the hard subs.
For whom? When? There are decent applications for this, some of them even free.
I've seen fantastic fansubbing work, with beautifully rendered, animated subtitles; and that was already years ago.
Making basic SRT's is easily accomplished in a rudimentary program like the old Subtitle Workshop by URUSoft: http://subworkshop.sourceforge.net/
(Looks like those guy have been active lately and have some new stuff out: http://www.uruworks.net/index.html )
Burning subs into a video is easily done with a ffmpeg one-liner (using its "libass" renderer or whatever). (Someone nontechnical may need help putting together that oneliner, but after that it's just repetition.) It's generally a bad idea; don't hard sub if you can avoid it and make the video available without the hard subs.