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Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

bemyeyes.org

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Re: Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

#161

Post by greggman »

After listening to the latest This American Life the first thing that occurs to me is though the intentions of this are good and their are some good uses for it this might have unintended consequences

The EP of This American Life is that basically with a little practice most blind people can learn to see with echolocation. Yes I know it sounds incredible but listen to the episode. The TL;DL version would be

(1) blind people can learn to echolocate

(2) MRI scans prove they are actually seeing, no colors but shapes

(3) People that could see but then went blind and learned to echolocate confirm they can see.

(4) The fact that most people think blind people can't do anything and need and then offer so much help prevents most blind people from learning to echolocate and start seeing.

don't shoot the messenger.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/544/b...

Re: Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

#162

Post by khebbie »

elicash wrote: post #117
ndarilek wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's actually an interesting bit of feedback. Thanks. I'm using SIP/web RTC for my for-profit version of this and had considered adding text chat, but I couldn't come up with a good use case so left it out. It'd probably also be useful when the text of something is important and you'd like a record after the call ended. I'll add that to the features list.

Yeah, I was about to use the Be My Eyes app to help and as soon as I realized I'd have to actually have a video/audio chat with a person, I admittedly chickened-out.

That is very interesting feedback. I am a developer from Be My Eyes. What could be done to make it less intimidating?

Re: Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

#163

Post by mcguire »

kimburgess wrote: post #151
ndarilek wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I haven't abandoned it--literally working on it this very minute, in fact. :) The problem is that multi-platform video interchange is a hard problem. Very hard. SIP only gets you so far even with web RTC, then you hit issues where server X doesn't like delegating authentication to anything else, Y does but requires super-indepth knowledge of the protocol, and Z may or may not but it's got so many modules it…

Ah yes, cross platform video. The bane of anyone who has ever worked with videoconferencing systems. If you're still working on it (ditto for the authors of Be My Eyes) it may be worth getting in touch with someone along the lines of Pexip[1] to see if they're interested in assisting with infrastructure and handling of media so that it's possible to focus on wrapping that is some beautiful UX for this use case. [1] h…

For completeness sake, I'd like to note that the OP doesn't seem to be cross-platform.

Re: Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

#164

Post by mcguire »

GabrielF00 wrote: post #139
JshWright wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's an example from real life (in person, not via this app). I have a buddy who is blind. In the US, paper currency is all the same size and shape, so it's impossible to distinguish them by feel alone. He uses a system of folds to remember which bill is which, but if he drops one, or the cashier doesn't tell him what the denominations are, etc..., he ends up not know which bill is which. Occasionally that means he…

There are scanners that a blind person can keep in their pocket or on a keychain that will scan currency and speak the denomination. http://www.orbitresearch.com/ibill_details.php

iBill® Talking Banknote Identifier, $119 with free shipping.

Re: Be My Eyes – Lend your eyes to the blind

#165

Post by ant6n »

tomjen3 wrote: post #160
modzilla wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know the answer to your question but it should be a required exercise for every web developer to use their website with a screen reader and a blindfold. It would change the way they/we build websites. I would submit an issue to HN to fix their accessibility – there is no excuse (for HN) not to. Edit: Sentence subject-ambiguity clarification.

That would be stupid for most sites - only a small minority of customers are blind and it isn't worth changing the entire site for them (unless you are amazon or you get it for free by using standard HTML things like links, buttons, etc). And before you scream ADA, that is a) nationalistic (not all web developers are in the US) b) usually something that can be worked around - e.g. put your phone number on the site as…

Accomodating people with disabilities is an ethical issue, not a numbers game.
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