20 comments

  • Justin BelcherJustin Belcher, over 8 years ago

    Wow, what a meaningful use of tech. I'd love to see our efforts shift more in this direction. Cheers to Hans & the Robocat crew.

    9 points
  • Christopher Mansfield, over 8 years ago

    For me this is true design, empowering and improving quality of life.

    However I do hope people keep working on more time trackers and invoicing software, that's like so super important. ;)

    6 points
    • Patrick SchneiderPatrick Schneider, over 8 years ago

      Now I feel bad for working on a time tracker :(

      But I certainly have to agree with you. I think any designer would love to be involved in something that truly helps people in a way that this app does.

      0 points
      • Christopher Mansfield, over 8 years ago

        Hehe, it was very tongue in cheek, people should do what they believe in and what makes them happy, if you have found that you are winning! :)

        0 points
    • brian andrichbrian andrich, over 8 years ago

      How is it empowering to give someone the fish instead of teaching them to catch it themselves? I think the visually impaired are quite capable of overcoming any obstacle they encounter themselves.

      1 point
  • Matt BaxterMatt Baxter, over 8 years ago

    Really great idea. I'm curious though; how is quality of responses monitored? Crowd-sourcing is great, but I think one of the challenges is always guaranteeing quality. I'd think that most decent people are actually there to help, but what stops some idiot from giving false information for "fun"?

    2 points
  • Jim SilvermanJim Silverman, over 8 years ago

    wow. i'd be really interested to see how this works on the blind person's end.

    2 points
    • Jeff EscalanteJeff Escalante, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )

      Yeah, while I generally am a fan of the idea of solving non-first-world-problems with tech, I'm curious whether this will actually be useful. It will probably take at least a couple minutes to take out the app, make the request, get connected to someone, have them get to grips with the situation, then provide the help. For small things like reading something, I have to assume that blind people have already figured out a way to deal with it in order to have got this far in life, and I wonder whether providing a solution with a lengthy delay will be more efficient than what they were already doing. At the same time, I know absolutely nothing about blind peoples' challenges, so the above is total uneducated speculation. Would love to hear from a blind person on their perception of the utility of a tool like this!

      4 points
      • Ruby ChenRuby Chen, over 8 years ago

        That's exactly what I thought... Also I thought there might be a larger situation to improve, such as the living environment, which may not be solved by a new app. For example, while using this app to find out if the milk is expired or not, I'm more curious how blind people check the expiration date before buying it in the first place. Should there be a better or tactile design to improve that? (or maybe it's already done but not good enough? sorry for my lack of knowledge about it.) Overall I'm pretty excited and interested seeing more apps like this having empathy in mind!

        1 point
  • Andy OrsowAndy Orsow, over 8 years ago

    Man, this is awesome—regardless of it's use or success, it's inspiring to see people solving problems that help people on an extremely individual / personal level.

    1 point
  • Veronica G.Veronica G., over 8 years ago

    ... and sometimes there's an app like this.

    0 points
  • Tommy SadlerTommy Sadler, over 8 years ago

    This is fantastic. I'm bummed I haven't been able to help anyone yet, but hopefully I'll get a notification soon. Another great app for the blind is TapTapSee. It's incredible how well it works. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/taptapsee-blind-visually-impaired/id567635020?mt=8

    0 points
  • Danny Zabolotny, over 8 years ago

    What would be great would be a truly universal image to text to speech app, so a blind person can point their smartphone at a piece of paper and the phone would read everything on the paper for them.

    0 points
  • Savelle McThiasSavelle McThias, over 8 years ago

    This is exactly the type of project I need in my life!

    0 points
  • Neil Berry, over 8 years ago

    Amazing idea!

    0 points
  • David AlandíDavid Alandí, over 8 years ago

    That's lovely.

    0 points