“Be My Eyes” | Seeing Possibilities

I downloaded the Be My Eyes app and tried it out recently. It was incredibly easy to use and very helpful. All you do is go to the app store and install the app. Then you select whether you are a sighted or blind user. When you need assistance, you open the app, which can be done with Siri and touch the middle of the screen to “connect to first available helper.” The app will then say “creating request” and “connecting to servers.” Then you get a musical tone and a message stating “waiting for other part.” The tone continues until someone answers the call and greets you. This can take a minute or two. On my first call, someone in Stockholm Sweden answered. It was morning for me and evening for him. The volunteer helped me choose between a regular coffee and a decaf coffee pod for my Keurig. All I had to do was point my phone at what I wanted to see and it showed up on the camera. The call lasted a minute or so. I thanked him kindly and said good-bye. Then I tapped at the bottom of the screen to disconnect the call.

I used Be My eyes again this morning. This time I chatted with the volunteer a moment. He was a firefighter in Ohio and commented on the extreme cold weather they were experiencing. I asked him what prompted him to sign up for Be My Eyes. He said he thought it was a way he could help out. The core philosophy of this app is the idea that we all need help at times and people are willing to help. It connects us to each other in a special way and I am certain there are benefits for both parties. Aren’t we living in amazing times?

“Be My Eyes” will help the blind “see” all kinds of things with the help of sighted volunteers and the video cameras on their i-phones. Here is the press release from www.bemyeyes.org :

New app lets sighted help blind people see

A new app makes life easier for the blind, by connecting them with sighted helpers through a smartphone app. This allows the blind to handle big and small tasks, while ighted get the joy of helping someone else in a easy and informal way. The app is called Be My Eyes and could revolutionize everyday life for the blind.

It only takes a minute to choose the right tin can from the shelf, look at the expiration date on the milk or find the right thing to eat in the fridge if have full vision that is. For visual impaired individuals smaller tasks in their home can often become bigger challenges. The new app is called “Be My Eyes” and hopes to change that!

Through a direct video call the app gives blind people the opportunity to ask a sighted volunteer for help, for tasks that requires normal vision. The blind person “borrows” the helper’s eyes all through his or her smartphone. The sighted helper is able to see and describe what the blind person is showing the sighted helper by filming with the video camera in the smartphone. That way, by working together they are able to solve the problem that the blind person is facing.

A test version of the app has been well received by the blind community. John Heilbrunn, himself blind and vice chairman of The Danish Association of the Blind, sees it as great opportunity to get help from a network of volunteers: »The app makes it possible to get help at times where it might be inconvenient to get help from neighbors or friends, and you don’t have to go apologetically and ask for help.«

The idea behind Be My Eyes originates from the Danish 50 year old furniture craftsman Hans Jørgen Wiberg, who started losing his vision when he was 25. His wish is that the app will make both the everyday life of blind people easier and new flexible opportunity to volunteer:»It is flexible, takes only a few minutes to help and the app is therefore a good opportunity for the busy, modernindividual with the energy to help others.« Says inventor Hans Jørgen Wiberg

The Be My Eyes app is free and available in the AppStore.

This app is similar to Tap Tap See only it is free. It will soon be available on androids too. Could this be helpful to you or someone you know? If you are sighted, would you be interested in “lending your eyes” and becoming a sighted helper?

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