Close your eyes and imagine you put your hands in a big bowl filled with sand where you find different objects. Your tactile sensors will be filled with unclear information. When touching the objects, feeling their shape and texture, you start to build a Spatial Representation. But has the Object you mentally created anything to do with reality? Despite the spatial representation in your mind, you can’t understand the true meaning of the object. Now imagine how it would be to use a cell phone or a computer without your sight.
Thousands of people encounter this challenge in their lives. Blindness or visual impairment makes the usage of these devices very complicated. But not anymore. With the AI evolution and the improvements in robotics, many innovations have appeared to make people’s life easier.
Aipoly is an object and color recognizer App that helps the blind and visually impaired to see the world through their smartphone. All they have to do is to simply point their phone at the object of interest, press a button and turn on the artificial intelligence.
VoiceOver, another extremely helpful revolution, tells you what’s on your screen and walks you through all kinds of actions using your keyboard or trackpad.
More recently, Facebook has announced they are working on a project that will make possible for blind people to see the photographs of their family and friends. How? A Virtual Assistant will tell them what’s on their photos. For now the descriptions are very vague and the VA’s way to communicate is far away from sounded natural and human. But this can be the beginning of a whole new use of Virtual Assistants.
Aforementioned App Aipoly, uses an AI algorithm to near-instantaneously identify an object when a smartphone is held over it and says what it is out loud, allowing those living with vision impairment to navigate their external surroundings and get around independently. Although you may think that the greatest improvement is exclusively related to the innovation in vision identification, a correct Virtual Robot will make this experience even more enjoyable and accurate. Through natural language, users will feel they are accompanied by a friend, not a machine, who is explaining the environment around them.
Social networks make possible the communication among people that are separated from miles away. Computers and smartphones offer a cornucopia of possibilities that improve our lives. The fact that blind people can use them and take advantage of them is a clear example of the importance of AI and social robotics, and serves to prove that Intelligent Virtual Assistants can do more than give us an address or a weather report.
