How is the only way to subscribe to #aira to call them and get it done? Seriously? It's 2025, they need a web portal.

But yeah, I've always had this fear when it comes to apps like #Aira or even #BeMyEyes, where because they're available, it means that businesses can decide to drop the ball on accessibility. since now blind people have access to a vertual care-taker.

Hey #Blind friends on #Mastodon who among you has #Aira plans and if so which ones? Thanks for helping a girl do research.

@AiraVI I think one of the big reasons #Walmart is considering #Aira is that they really, really, really do not want their employees having to help their blind customers in their stores. I know of several recent incidents here in #Arizona where a blind person was flatly denied any shopping assistance at all. It's a basic thing we've been doing for decades now but Walmart just wants to wimp out and find the solution that will be easiest on their bottom line. #accessibility

Good morning, Mastodon family!

With all that is going on, this verbose toot that I am about to write may seem insignificant, but I just had to share with my fellow #blind community members, particularly those who work in #law and have served in #court proceedings, specifically on a #jury. Especially since January 20 of this year, I've been earnestly praying for opportunities to speak up for my disability community. One of my answers came in the form of a jury summons to serve in municipal court later in March. This came, of course, via regular mail, a printed letter which I read using Seeing AI. The letter included a form that needed to be returned within ten days of receipt, so I called the number provided to ask for an accessible form and to discuss the necessary reasonable accommodations.

The first person to answer my call was doing a lot of rattling of things on the desk and shuffling of papers, to the point that I asked if she could hear me. Finally, she said, "Oh, ma'am, I thought you were a recording. Let me transfer you to the person in charge of that court."

When the next person answered, I explained that I am blind and asked what accessible accommodation was available for submitting the form which came with my jury summons. She said, "Ma'am, if you are traveling that week, just mark the box on that form and you can serve at another time."

I said, "No, ma'am, I am not traveling. I am blind (spelling the word blind)."

The response was, "Oh, I thought you said you were flying. Don't you have someone there with you to help you with this form?"

"No, ma'am, do you have a digital version of this form?"

"No, we don't, but I'll just mark down that you are incapable of serving."

"No, ma'am! I will find a way to submit this form."

After a call to the mayor's office, I contacted #Aira, and with a lot of trial and error, my wonderful agent, Nicki captured the form, filled it out on her end and Emailed it back to me. I forwarded it on to the representative of the municipal court, and received a polite response this morning, saying that my completed summons had been received and that I was excused per our phone conversation yesterday.

I responded, explaining that I was *not* trying to get out of jury duty, that I own my home, work and pay taxes, and that serving as a juror is not only my responsibility, but my civil right. I clarified my request for reasonable accommodation per the Americans With Disabilities Act and further said that I had contacted the mayor's office about the inaccessibility of this process.

It was not long before I received an email response, apologizing for the misunderstanding, that I had been marked as serving and that my concerns had been passed on to the court administrator.

Whew! All that, just to serve on a jury! We'll see how things go later in March. At least I got the proverbial brick wall to move a tiny bit, anyway. Thanks for reading this. If there is anything that you think I need to know from the prospective of a blind juror, feel free to comment.

I was trying to arrange some travel insurance for a trip I’m making next year. Admiral Insurance wanted to know how easy it was to use their portal, so I told them. It was awful. So inaccessible with JAWS that I had to call #AIRA & get an agent to complete the form for me. Honestly, web #Accessibility never seems to get any better.

I was just thinking... we currently have Be My AI from Be My Eyes, Access AI from Aira, Seeing AI from Microsoft, and Ally from Envision. And guess what, they are all currently totally free to use! Man, how lucky we are to have these great tools for our toolbox! For those who remember... even though it was a great app in its time, we have come a long way since TapTapSee. #BeMyEyes #Aira #SeeingAI #Envision #Tools #Blind

#aira find. Hi everyone. I just noticed when browsing in the Ira app on the main page on the iPhone app below the call Ira button, there is a customise call and you can select and turn on one of the options your reason for calling an agent. I don’t know whether I will use this feature I will just continue to tap the call agent button because having to give a reason for calling, I don’t actually know what this customise option does on the agent side. Has anybody actually used this customise call option and if so, did you notice anything different about the Ira experience?

Why can’t we get a #3DPrinter that actually talks? Like you’d think someone would want this to be the case, but nope and it kinda sucks because as a #Blind person, whenever I want to print anything, I have to load up #BeMyEyes or #AIRA and hope that things work out and I can get the screen read to me. Very much appreciate the help from various people on both apps, but man a talking printer interface would be a game-changer for the blind, and seeing as printing is pretty highly tactile, its definitely something to look to for sure.

I'm so glad Remote Incident Manager is being integrated in to #Aira. It seems some of their agents have not yet gotten that memo as they're not yet set up with RIM. I've started our process for getting #RIM approved as software we can install on our work computers. #accessibility

Does an #AI exist yet that can accept a PDF and convert it to any accessible format, describing the icons and other images it contains along the way? I see that #Aira and #BeMyEyes only accept image formats. Any ideas would be appreciated. #accessibility

So excited about #AIRA and rim that's all kinds of awesome and I think the build AI should be open to all users, including our friends outside the U.S.

Exciting times for the blind community! AIRA is testing new wearable tech like the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses & ARx AI headset to provide even more hands-free visual assistance. As a commercial service, AIRA’s innovative additions ensure we can quickly and efficiently benefit from their enhancements. Stay tuned for more accessible tech! #Accessibility #Blind #TechInnovation #AIRA #RayBanMeta #ARxAI #WearableTech #AssistiveTechnology #Inclusion

I tried the first iteration of #Aira glasses all the way back in 2017 and I found them unreliable with their associated WiFi hotspot. I tried the wired ones and actually liked them a lot better, but they were quickly discontinued.

Exciting news! Aira is launching a pilot program with #Meta #Ray-Ban smart glasses, enhancing their integration with visual interpreting services. These glasses, already a hit in the blind community, will now offer even more seamless access to visual information through Aira.
The pilot aims to refine user experience and ensure smooth integration for hands-free convenience. If you’re an Explorer with these glasses and an iPhone 13 or newer, join the pilot and help shape the future of accessibility!
#Blind #Accessibility #SmartGlasses #Aira #Innovation

I’ve just submitted a request to be included in the #AIRA test programme for using my Meta Rayban glasses to make AIRA calls. This would be a terrific feature if they can make it work, and would be another excellent reason for visually impaired people to use the Meta Raybans.
Now I want the Meta AI feature to arrive in the UK. There were rumours of its arrival in June, but I’m still waiting.
#Accessibility #Tech

In the UK, we’ve had ‘Sight as a service’ for decades. Thirty or more years ago we had the Personal Reader Service (PRS) that, from memory, provided people in work with someone to read to them for up to fifteen hours a week. Even though I had a “reading machine” called the Kurzweil Reading Edge at the time, PRS was vital because the machines couldn’t read hand-written material and weren’t portable.
Over the past twenty-five years, I have benefited from ‘Sight as a service’ in many more ways:

1. In work I used a ‘driver guide’ employed to drive my company car and guide me at events.
2. In work I used a ‘support worker’ to help me complete tasks that included hand-written items.
3. In work I had a ‘driver’ when I had the sort of workload that couldn’t be completed if I had to use public transport – it took me way too long to realise how much more relaxing walking out the house and getting into a car was, compared to a journey of three taxis and two trains.
4. At university I had a ‘personal assistant’ who helped me use a vital, but inaccessible, software package.
5. At college I had a ‘support worker’ who basically did everything for me other than the actual work, which made me v-lazy!

I could go on, I took a support worker with me once when I had to travel internationally, used to have someone with me at conferences (to help with networking) and on and on. The main thing to remember from all these examples is that these people where all provided (paid) by someone else, not me.

Although blind and visually impaired people in the UK had been receiving a benefit aimed at providing help with ‘personal care’ for decades, most people I met didn’t use this to purchase ‘Sight as a service’ as such, not in the way they would for work or at school, instead they would ‘have a cleaner’, eat out or take taxis and would ‘pay’ for it out of there benefit.

Eventually ‘sight as a service’ came to the iPhone – the two most popular (and surviving) apps being ‘AIRA Explorer’ and ‘Be My Eyes’. Both these apps connect you to a sighted person who can ‘see’ through your phone’s camera and tell you what they see. One is free, connecting you to a volunteer, the other requires a subscription and connects you to a professionally trained Visual Interpreter. The subscription service offers many ways to reduce costs, including schemes whereby individual companies and even specific locations can offer free access.

Blind people deserve choice and AIRA and Be My Eyes are both excellent services, the free service is as good as the paid alternative, within the limits of a volunteer-led model. I have used them both and expect to carry on doing so in the future. But for now, AI has come to ‘Sight as a service’ and that will be the subject of my next post.

For now, comments and questions are welcome. What is ‘Sight as a service’ like where you live? How have you used it? How would you like to?
#Accessibility #AIRA #BeMyEyes #Blind #Disability

1. I've just come across a website that I had to check with #Aira, because there was an inaccessible #captcha on it.
2. Bypassing the captcha by clicking 'next' *looks* like it would be valid and you can fill out content on future pages, but when you get to the end, you're told to: 'Correct the errors highlighted.'
Not much help to a #ScreenReader user.
3. Terms and conditions are on-click, not bogstandard checkboxes, so you're not always sure whether it's checked or not checked.
4. The country select was not a standard combo/list box, but a weird spin control that didn't at all play nicely.

It's one of those days and it isn't even Thursday...

I've been #Blind for nearly 40 years. I carry a high-end iPhone and smart glasses with a handful of AI-powered computer vision app...what do I 'look' at most of the time? #Caturday images on Mastodon. I think I need to learn to see again at the same time as my technology learns to see. #Accessibility #AIRA #AIsoftheBlind #ComputerVision #Envision #SmartGlasses #Seleste