BlankI guess we’d better get it while they are still offering it for free.
Sounds wonderful. I’ll be hopping on this band wagon for sure.
Vickie Rolison
From: Steve
Sent: Friday, July 14, 2017 6:04 PM
To: the-facts-machine@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ; msb-alumni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [the-facts-machine] Microsoft's new, free iPhone app helps the blind
see
Microsoft's new, free iPhone app helps the blind see By Matt Day Seattle Times
Microsoft has released the free Seeing AI smartphone application, available for
iOS, that can read
out short snippets of text, describe people, identify products and currency
denominations, and take a stab at identifying the objects in a person's
surroundings.
. Microsoft on Wednesday released a smartphone application far more ambitious
than its bread and butter Office software: an effort to help the blind see. The
free Seeing AI app, available for iOS, can read out short snippets of text,
describe people, identify products and currency denominations, and take a stab
at identifying the objects in a person's surroundings.
The app relies on the iPhone camera, backed by Microsoft's machine-learning and
image-recognition algorithms. The company didn't say whether a version would be
released for Android phones.
Seeing AI takes its name from the Microsoft research project that developed the
tool. The Redmond company revealed the effort last year at its Build developer
show, demonstrating how a more-developed version might help Saqib Shaikh, a
Microsoft engineer on the team who lost his sight at age 7. The app is
available in the U.S., Canada,
India, New Zealand and Hong Kong.
Seeing AI joins a small group of apps designed to help visually impaired
people. Most others are aimed at a single task,
like identifying a color or reading text aloud.