Culture

People are sharing their heartwarming experiences with an app that lets you ‘see’ for blind people

via Be My Eyes

Smartphones and voice-activated technology have been a huge blessing for the visually-impaired.

They make it much easier for visually-impaired people to access information while making day-to-day activities a lot more convenient.

Before smartphones, they would have to carry multiple items such as GPS devices, voice-activated note takers, and bar scanners.

Now, a new app called Be My Eyes is making life a lot easier for visually-impaired people by connecting them to people with sight via Facetime. It also gives sighted volunteers the opportunity to give back.

Be My Eyes was created by Hans Jorgen Wiberg, a visually-impaired man, in 2015. Visually-impaired people would often use Facetime to ask friends and family members for help.

So Wilberg created Be My Eyes so they wouldn't have to be as reliant on personal relationships.

Visually-impaired people use the app for countless purposes, including finding lost things in their homes, reading labels, counting money, and matching their clothes.

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In four years, the community has grown to over 140,000 low-vision or blind users and over 2.5 million volunteers. There are so many people who've signed up to help that sometimes it takes weeks for them to receive their first call.

"When we launched, we didn't know if people would be willing to volunteer time to help complete strangers," Alexander Hauerslev Jensen, the CCO of Be My Eyes, told The Guardian. "But within the first 24 hours, we had more than 10,000 volunteers."

"The fact that we have so many volunteers enables us to have a really fast response time. I see it as a good problem," he continued. "It takes a few minutes to make a big impact on someone else's life. This is a combination of technology and human generosity."

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People who've signed up for the app as volunteers have been raving about their experiences on Twitter. Here are just a few of the recent experiences they've had as Be My Eyes volunteers.

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