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Your weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs.
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Hi. This is Pramit. I’m the founder of Louie Voice control. This is the, Your Assistive Technology Update.
Josh Anderson:
Welcome to your assistive technology update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology, designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. Welcome to episode 505 of Assistive Technology Update it’s scheduled to be released on January 29th, 2021. On today’s show, we are super excited to have Pramit on. He is the founder of Louie Voice Control, and he’s going to tell us all about this exciting technology. We also have a story about some of the accessible tech coming out of CES this year, which of course was fully remote as pretty much everything is these days. We also have a fun story about increasing accessibility by building ramps, using Lego bricks. Let’s go ahead and get on with the show.
Josh Anderson:
You find yourself a little bit more time on your hands. Maybe you’re really busy and only have a little bit of time to listen to podcasts or maybe listening to this has you thinking, “Well, what about this? What about that?” Well, if you’re short on time, or if you have questions about assistive technology, we have other podcasts that might just fit your needs. The first one is accessibility minute. This one minute long podcast gives you a little taste of assistive technology and really kind of wet your whistle to gather you, go out and find out more about a piece of technology and how it might help those you work with, yourself or maybe a friend or family member. If you happen to have questions about assistive technology, we have assistive technology frequently asked questions or ATFAQ. The show is hosted by Brian Norton and features yours truly along with Belva Smith and Tracy Castillo.
Josh Anderson:
As we all talk about assistive technology with questions that come in from email, phone calls, and other means. We also don’t always know the answer, so it’s very important that we have listeners that can help us out with some of those questions, because while we like to think every once in a while that we may know everything, we’re proven wrong almost daily on that one. If you’re looking for more podcasts to listen to, if you’re short on time and need a really quick podcast, or if you have questions about assistive technology, make sure to check out Accessibility Minute and Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions, wherever you get your podcasts.
Josh Anderson:
As CES wraps up here in 2021, I found a good story over at CNET and it’s titled Accessibility Devices at CES 2021, Reflect Growing Focus on Inclusive Tech, it’s written by Abrar Al-Heeti. It talks about some of the different accessibility devices that should have a CES this year.
Josh Anderson:
Now, of course, a big part of CES this year was sanitation. Some things to kill viruses and stuff because, well, that’s kind of front of mind for everybody, but also I think this last year and a lot of people moving to remote, be that schools, be that employers and real shift to doing everything online, has really highlighted how important accessibility is. I want to go over to some of the things that are highlighted here in this story. Of course, I’m sure there’s many, many more, and hopefully we’ve kind of find those and hopefully, maybe even have some of these folks on the show here to talk about some of these different things, a little bit more in depth. It starts off by talking about the Mantis Q40, which is a Bluetooth qwerty keyboard that includes a refreshable braille display and it’s made by the American Printing House, or APH.
Josh Anderson:
It actually kind of starts with a quote here from Greg Stilson. It says, “Inclusive design is now a topic that’s talked about in the mainstream. Even five years ago, inclusive design was not top of mind for designers, but now it’s kind of really getting there.” Back to kind of the Mantis Q40, this is much like any other braille displays. It does have the full qwerty keyboard. It’s not the small braille keyboard that has the different keys to actually type in braille. Then it has the 40 cell refreshable display. It can connect up to five different Bluetooth devices at one time, and also has a USB connection that you can use. Works with Mac, PC and iOS and Android and Chromebook support should be coming soon. Much like most braille displays, it is a little pricey, about $2,500, which is kind of standard and pretty close to the same as many other comparable devices.
Josh Anderson:
They also have a smaller Chameleon 20 device, which of course has the 20 cell braille display and it’s about $1,600. It does have the braille keyboard rather than the qwerty keyboard. Also, talks a little bit here that APH is developing a dynamic tactile device that would create multiple lines of braille, so a blind student for instance, could have immediate access to an image diagram or shape that’s being discussed in class. It says, “Of course, they’re really hoping to be able to create lower-cost refreshable braille tech with this device.” That’s something that we all kind of hope can really come sometime in the future because those devices have always been kind of expensive and probably always will be. Hopefully, some technology here in the future will come out that can just make those things much more mainstream and make that price a little more accessible for that accessible device.
Josh Anderson:
The next device that talks about is the Oticon More, and I really hope I’m pronouncing that correctly. This is a hearing device. It actually says that hearing devices are starting to get more attention at CES in the recent years. Some of these are getting a boost from artificial intelligence. We’ve had some folks here on the show to talk about a little bit of technology and how that artificial intelligence can really help folks with hearing, because it can use that artificial intelligence to filter out the sound you don’t need while letting in the sounds that you’re actually trying to hear. This Oticon More is made by a hearing aid manufacturer called Oticon. It’s designed to help users with hearing loss, better understand speech and pick up on sounds that they really need to hear. Embedded in the hearing aids chip is a neural network, which mimics how human brains process data. It’s trained on 12 million real life sounds, which is a heck of a lot.
Josh Anderson:
I don’t think I can name 12 million sounds if I really had to. Essentially it just learns what it is that you want to hear. It can filter out the noisy environment, just like a human brain does think about whenever you’re really trying to focus on someone and you’re looking at their lips. You’re really trying to hear that. Well, this can do some of that for you. It does support streaming from iPhone and from some Android devices, has eight different colors and costs are set by individual hearing care professionals. Of course, this is something that you would have to go to your hearing professional in order to kind of be prescribed. It doesn’t really say a whole lot about prices here, but I know these things can be a little bit expensive. Some other smart hearing devices this year include the Kit Personal Sound Amplifier.
Josh Anderson:
This features noise reduction technology and resembles a pair of earbuds attached to a neck band. It features three different listening modes, focus mode, which can kind of hone in on the person in front of you, environment mode, which provides more overall awareness while also scaling back unwanted noise and group mode for social settings, which enhances speech 180 degrees in front of the wearer and reduces background noise. Kind of a sign of the time signia has a large range of smart hearing aids, as well as something called face mask mode, which can help people better understand speech through face mask, just touch a button on an app and the hearing aid will focus on a person’s speech signals, making words sound clearer and reducing background noise. It’s kind of fun that we do see that face mask mode coming in there. That’s something that I suppose we kind of figured would have to kind of make its way in there.
Josh Anderson:
The next thing it talks about is the HeardThat app. It’s really good to see that on there because we actually had them on the show here not too long ago. Very good. Hopefully, you listen to that if not go back and listen to the HeardThat episode and you can find out a whole lot more about that app. The next thing that it talks about here at CES is the Aware app and the Aware app, which is made by Sensible Innovations, offers turn by turn descriptive navigation for users. They can place their phone in their pocket and listen as the app announces places they pass. They can tell the app where they want to go and it will tell them that they’ve arrived to their destination, but it also provides an audio description of locations such as the store’s layout. It says here, “Their wares is currently available on iOS and will soon launch for Android.”
Josh Anderson:
The next one I have on here is something called Sravi, S-R-A-V-I. This is AI based lip reading technology and the app is made to recognize specific phrases by analyzing lip movements. Of course, this can be helpful for folks with speech difficulties or patients in critical care with ailments that render them incapable of speaking. The app is currently in trials with the UKs national health service, and it’s slated to launch commercially sometime this spring. It says so far in those tests, it’s been very helpful in intensive care units, especially with folks with COVID-19 that are maybe on ventilators or intubated and are unable to speak. This app can be held up and actually read their lip movements to see what they are saying. I can see tons of different ways that this would be able to help folks in the future in myriad of ways. Just being able to read lips for folks with speech impairments, with hearing impairment, with all different kinds of impairments.
Josh Anderson:
This artificial intelligence could really help a lot of folks with different communication barriers. Those are all the new tech that is highlighted in this story. I love this time of year when I get to see these stories come out and of course, CES says everything was remote this year. I’m sure getting the word out about this technology was extremely hard for these companies this year, but as with anything, there is new innovation and it seems like a lot of these do have that artificial intelligence component that we’re starting to see in a lot of technology. I’ll continue to scour and see what else we can find from CES. Hopefully, maybe find some of these folks and have them on the show here in the near future.
Josh Anderson:
Before we get into our interview, I’ve got a fun story from the Star Online, and it’s how Lego ramps for wheelchairs are helping provide access for all. This talks about a little town over in Germany and an individual who truly had a gigantic problem with a five centimeter high curb.
Josh Anderson:
This individual, Julian Wendell, couldn’t make it into his favorite cafe because of the curb out front. I’m not sure if he went around, had to go way down the street and come back or what exactly it was, but essentially this small curb kept him out of his favorite cafe. If we really think about this, I mean, we’re maybe a little spoiled in America. While everything isn’t completely accessible, the ADA does kind of set parameters in most, at least new builds, do have some sort of ramp or access in there. Especially in places where things are a little bit older were built a long time ago, that retrofitting can be very expensive. It doesn’t always happen. Luckily, a solution was found, Lego bricks. It says here there’s actually a group trying to remember independent living for individuals with disabilities in the German city of Wurzburg.
Josh Anderson:
It says they used around 1500 pieces to build an extremely colorful ramp made out of Legos. It’s very eye-catching. It actually serves two purposes. Not only does it allow an individual to access different places by having this ramp, but also, it’s a bit of an eye catcher. If you think about all those colorful blocks and everything, so people can see it. When you see these things and it gets in your mind, maybe you start looking at other places that aren’t accessible and other things that you might be able to do. They may have seen a little bit about this kind of story before.
Josh Anderson:
There’s an individual called Rita Ebell. She was one of the first people to promote the building of Lego ramps and actually gained her the nickname of Lego granny. I’ve got a quote here from her that says, “I wanted to get people thinking about creating a more disability friendly society. I also want to encourage people to get out there and start improving things themselves.” It says here that she provides volunteers with help and advice about how to construct the ramps and has also made instructions available in German, English, French, Italian, and Spanish. A lot of people are really trying to kind of jump in and be able to help doing this. Of course, one of the biggest barriers or hurdles to kind of overcome is, that’s a lot of bricks. 1500 Legos to make each one of these is a whole lot of bricks. As I’m reading through this, it really had a fact that I would have never thought about. It says here that there is some encouragement to bear in mind, the manufacturers of Lego recently estimated there are about 60 times as many Lego bricks in the world as there are people.
Josh Anderson:
Wow. I think about my kids at home and how many Legos there are, and goodness gracious, there are a ton of them. It does say that they are setting up different donation boxes all over this city in order to take donations of Legos. Maybe this is something we’ll see kind of expand and with all those different languages, maybe we’ll see this in some different spots and maybe you’ll see these donation boxes kind of pop up, but very, very cool way to kind of increase accessibility. Maybe it’s not assistive technology, or I would say it’s definitely low tech assistive technology, but I just think of all of the great things that my kids have been able to build and some of the fun they’ve been able to have with Legos.
Josh Anderson:
Then using some of that skill to really help other folks out and just make the whole world a little bit more accessible. We’ll put a link to this over in our show notes so that you can check it out for yourself. Very, very fun story and a great way that people are using something in a whole new way to increase accessibility for all.
Josh Anderson:
Screen readers have really helped to make smartphones one of the more accessible devices on the market. With a series of taps swipes and other gestures, an individual can access these devices without ever having to look at the screen. These controls can be hard to learn. They can vary from app to app. If you have any mobility or motor challenges, they can almost be impossible. What if you were able to just talk to your smartphone and take control of the functions that you really need? Well, our guest today has brought his friend Louie along, that may offer just that kind of accessibility. Pramit, welcome to the show.
Pramit Bhargava:
Thank you for having me here.
Josh Anderson:
I am really excited to talk about Louie Voice, but before we get into that, could you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and your background?
Pramit Bhargava:
Yeah, sure. I’ve actually led almost half my life, the initial half, of course, as a person with normal vision and the second half with the visual impairment. I am by education, a computer engineer who then get an MBA. Then I’ve worked with global companies like [inaudible 00:14:38], Motorola, Chris Diagnostics. It puts me 20 years back that I was given a drug for some rheumatic pains back reacted on my retina. I had a sudden loss of vision. I could still get some connections. Then all the years, my vision kept dropping, dropping. I think it was about nine years back that I suddenly realized that now I cannot read anything at all. My vision was dropping fast and I just went through what I call a loss phase. I was confused. I just didn’t know how to use because I couldn’t see, I was dependent on everybody for even simplest of tasks, even to pick up a phone call because I wouldn’t know who is calling and I had no knowledge of accesive technologies, what is available. It was all those three year kind of a phase, when I was sitting at home doing nothing.
Josh Anderson:
I know that kind of led you into creating Louie Voice Control. Tell us what is Louie?
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay. If I could maybe start with what inspired me because that will, I think, bring a light to the concept as well. I had gone to meet a friend and this was just after this loss phase. I was trying to come back into some kind of normal life. On the way back, my friend offered to book an Uber for me. He took my spot phone and he said, “Okay, where do you want to go?” I give him my resignation address. He said, “Okay, well, what is showing these three options? Which one should I take?” I said, “Okay, take this one.” Then similarly he told me the rides available, the fair. I asked him to pick out this one. He confirmed with me, how will I pay? Then we did the booking and he even called the driver for me.
Pramit Bhargava:
On the way back in Uber, I just thought, “Oh boy, that was an amazing experience.” The great thing about it was that I was always in control because as a visual impaired, I realized that I want to be independent and in control. Then suddenly this thought struck, what about if I can build a virtual friend right here on the phone screen, which can do exactly what my friend was doing with me, which is he was letting me use Uber completely by voice commands, number one. Number two, there was continuous voice interaction. I was always in control. This is how Louie was born. Just in a nutshell, Louie Voice Control is nothing but a simple app. Just think of it as a friend. You can give it the voice commands and whichever app that Louie supports, the user can just with voice commands, do each and everything within an app, just like any sighted person would be.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. I love the way that you described that as kind of a virtual friend who just goes through things as if somebody was there kind of helping you, but being able to do that independently. Now, I know phone’s kind of have some voice control already there. What makes Louie different than those built-ins?
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay. Louie, as I said, especially designed keeping a blind person in mind, hence the example that I gave you of my friend helping me book an Uber, Louie, unlike voice assistance does a continuous two way interaction. Now, that’s something very important. Whether want to book your Uber end to end, or you want to browse around, or do you want to manage, see videos on YouTube. It’s very important that there is continuous two way voice interaction. Also, that Louie has the ability to allow a user to do each and everything within an app. Now, that’s sadly something that voice assistants don’t do today. They will take a command and then go silent. Also, whatever the support are really superficial two or three things. There’s a dramatic difference. I think it comes from the fact that my being visually impaired, trying to solve my own problem and therefore building something specifically for visually impaired requirements.
Josh Anderson:
Pramit, what apps does Louie currently work with?
Pramit Bhargava:
Louie’s a work in progress. We started with Uber and then we did WhatsApp, YouTube. It can also completely manage contracts, edit, delete blog. One can call, one can do text messages and there are a whole a lot of apps. Also, the pinpoints of visually impaired, which we are working on right now.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. This is available on the Android operating system, is that correct?
Pramit Bhargava:
Yes. Currently on Android, but next year, second half, we are going to do a technical feasibility for iPhones as well. I hope it will be out soon for iPhone. Yeah.
Josh Anderson:
Oh, that’s excellent. Pramit, do you have to be running talk back on the Android or does Louie kind of do everything for you?
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay. Since I’m just trying to solve my own problem with Louie. I personally use talk back all the time. The way Louie is built is that it will auto detect whether there is a screen reader running or no those screen reader. It works in either way. It will just auto adjust. If you are running talk back, it works perfectly. If you’re not running the talk back, it again, works perfectly.
Josh Anderson:
Oh, that’s nice because that’s one less thing you have to go and change. I’m glad you, you kind of thought about that and put that in there.
Pramit Bhargava:
I think we have made it more like an open app. Similarly, for example, you can use any voice engine of your choice, any voice. Again, you can therefore, customize it for Louie. That’s the whole idea, that you just make it seamless. You install it and you start using it. the learning curve is just not there yet.
Josh Anderson:
That’s great because I know kind of before we started talking, we talked about the learning curve for folks who are trying to learn all the, all the different gestures and everything. Sometimes it varies from app to app or maybe you get a new phone and it’s a little bit different. That’s great that it’s just intuitive, and like you said, like a friend just sitting there talking to you and walking you through all those steps.
Pramit Bhargava:
Absolutely. Every time I have, I just think of that particular incident that I told you, that experience. I just close my eyes and I think of Louis as a friend sitting right across the table and just helping me out. That’s the experience that we are trying to build in.
Josh Anderson:
That’s excellent. Kind of talking about that for me, I’m sure you probably get lot of feedback from folks that have used it. Can you tell me a story about maybe how Louie has made a change in a user’s life?
Pramit Bhargava:
Yeah, sure. Okay. Before I do that, I just want to say, I get feedback from lots of users across the world. Right away, we have users in 70 countries. One thing which I was very keen on because sometimes you may get great feedback and an app would be flavor of the month. What was important here is that we could genuinely feel in the feedback that we are filling a need. This kind of app is needed where I can do everything with voice commands. There are lots of stories. I’ll give you simple examples of professor, who’s so dependent on Louie.
Pramit Bhargava:
He’s blind. He gets a lot of these documents, which get shared to him with them on WhatsApp and one day he changed his phone. For some reason, he was finding it difficult to re-install and he called us. We worked with him for a couple of hours and he was back in action. That was Saturday night. Similarly, somebody in Poland actually [inaudible 00:21:55]. He tried the app. He saw he was cited. Then he bought a phone for his mother in Canada so that he and her, his mother, could talk on WhatsApp, because his mother was just not able to use the smartphones.
Josh Anderson:
Those are great examples in great ways. I’m sure that as you get more of that feedback, you’ll even think of maybe new things that it can kind of do.
Pramit Bhargava:
Absolutely. In fact, I can tell you last [inaudible 00:22:22] year, each and every development, whether it’s product improvement, whether it’s a new apps being voice controlled, is all happening, based on user feedback. I’ll give you one simple example that we’re working on. A lot of users told us that you’re not doing a Google search, browsing around, reading articles, reading documents is an area of difficulty. We have started working on it right now. User users have asked to voice control apps whereby they can order food. They can do e-commerce, so that’s the whole idea, that we just keep the user feedback and keep improving the app all the time.
Josh Anderson:
Oh, that’s excellent. You already kind of told me some of the great things that you’re working on, but really where do you see Louie going in the future?
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay. Louie, I see it, like I already said, like a friend, a companion. The way we want to develop it is, by the way, it’s specially designed keeping a blind person in mind. The assumption is that the person cannot see the screen. The way we want to build up, if you ask me three years from now, it’s like a friend who’s an integral part of a visually impaired life. Everything that you need on the phone, be it starting your day, I mean just whatever other needs around us. Once you’ll be able to use Louie to not just control the phone, control all the apps that we normally need for our support system and all of this by just voice commands.
Josh Anderson:
Very nice. That’s great cause especially for you talking about the individual that was using it for his mom, I think about especially older individuals, learning how to use a cell phone isn’t easy for an older individual with sight. Being able to kind of have that friend and that little bit of help can really just open up doors and open up communication, especially as we’re all kind of away from each other and everything else. That is absolutely great. I do have to ask you, where did the name Louie come from?
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay, great question. We always knew that it’s going to be a global app. We were looking for a simple name, short and sweet, easy to pronounce, whether you are in Russia or South Africa or US. Then so one of the ad agencies actually came up with the name, Louie. Of course, the inspiration comes from Louie Brail and the inspiration is very simple. I think braille, we all know that Taz has had a huge impact on the lives of visually impaired. With Louie, I’m hoping that we would be able to at least have a small impact, but it could be something dramatic because now, it’s an [inaudible 00:00:24:58], where you can just do everything by voice.
Josh Anderson:
Definitely. It’s intuitive and easy because it’s the way that we kind of do everything anyway. That’s a great help for me too. If our listeners want to find out more, what’s the best way for them to find out more or to get Louie for themselves.
Pramit Bhargava:
Okay. It’s there on the Google play store, where there’s a description. There is a video as well. I will just spell out Louie. It is L-O-U-I-E. The app is called Louie voice control. If somebody wants to get in touch with me, and by the way, I give my WhatsApp number, mobile number, email number, email ID freely, so that users can just get in touch with me directly. My email ID is Pramit, P-R-A-M-I-T@louievoice.com. Pramit@Louievoice.com.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. We’ll make sure to put that down into the show notes so that folks can easily find that and get in touch with you with any feedback, questions, or anything else that they might have. Pramit, thank you so much for coming on here today and telling us all about Louie Voice. I do wish you all the luck in the world and I look forward to a day where people, can just easily pick up their phone and do everything they might need by voice.
Pramit Bhargava:
Absolutely. Thank you so much.
Josh Anderson:
Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? If you do, call our listener line at (317) 721-7124. Shoot us a note on Twitter at Indata Project, or check us out on Facebook. Are you looking for a transcript or show notes? Head on over to our website at www.eastersealstech.com. Assistive Technology Update is a proud member of the accessibility channel. For more shows like this, plus so much more, head over to accessibilitychannel.com. The views expressed by our guests are not necessarily that of this host or the Indata project. This has been your Assistive Technology Update. I’m Josh Anderson with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in Indianapolis, Indiana. Thank you so much for listening and we’ll see you next time.
