Be My Eyes: Mobile micro-volunteering for the blind with Hans Wiberg

Explicit content warning

09/26/18 • 42 min

Innovation For All - Diversity in Tech and Business

Host Sheana Ahlqvist speaks with Hans Jørgen Wiberg, founder of Be My Eyes, a free mobile app that connects blind and visually impaired individuals with sighted volunteers through live video calls. Wiberg explains how Be My Eyes works, how he monetized an app while keeping it free for both sides of the marketplace, and how important it is to consider how blind people interact with the world around them when designing products and services

You’ll learn:

What is microvolunteering?
What is Be My Eyes and how does it work?
How can we design products so that they are more accessible to the blind?
How can one monetize and keep sustainable a product or service, especially one that is designed for a low-income population, without charging users?
What are some challenges facing Be My Eyes and similar apps in their efforts to support specific populations worldwide?

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/message
Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/support

You’ll learn:

What is microvolunteering?
What is Be My Eyes and how does it work?
How can we design products so that they are more accessible to the blind?
How can one monetize and keep sustainable a product or service, especially one that is designed for a low-income population, without charging users?
What are some challenges facing Be My Eyes and similar apps in their efforts to support specific populations worldwide?

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/message
Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/support

Previous Episode

Implicit Bias: Everything You're Afraid to Ask - Jordan Axt

Discover how you can learn about and reduce implicit bias in this conversation with Dr. Jordan Axt (@jordanaxt).
Learn: How can we reduce or change an individual’s level of implicit bias? What's the IAT? Does it work? Where do we go from here?

Have you ever wondered why you always like people a little more if they’re fans of the same baseball team as you, and like them a little less if they’re fans of your team’s archrivals? Or wondered if your sex, gender, sexual orientation, or even physical appearance had something to do with why you did or didn’t get that job you interviewed for?
These thoughts all relate to the concept of implicit bias. Implicit bias is related to thoughts, feelings, attitudes outside our conscious control that contribute to gender, race, and social status implications.

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Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/support

Next Episode

The 80/20 rule hurts everything from education to self-driving cars with Jutta Treviranus

In this episode of Innovation for All, host Sheana Ahlqvist talks to Dr. Jutta Treviranus, Director of the Inclusive Design Research Centre at OCAD University in Toronto. Dr. Treviranus explains how traditional approaches to business, design practices, and research can results in suboptimal or unfair systems. They discuss what inclusive design is, why it is so important, and how we can design systems that accommodate everyone. Dr. Treviranus also reimagines the future of education. They cover her efforts to incorporate inclusivity into the current change-resistant educational system, her “Unlearning and Questioning” course, and her most recent project: developing a lab school for inclusive life-long learning. YOU’LL LEARN: • How to use AR to combine real data with simulated data to create and experience new, imagined futures • What is the Pareto Principle (80/20 Principle)? • What are the real world consequences of ignoring the “20%”? • What is the Cobra Effect?

Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/message
Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/innovation-for-all/support