We've been lucky enough to capture the success of the Be My Eyes team on our microphones for years. And while the BBQ doesn't have 6 million volunteers, and 200,000 Blind or Low Vision users, we are happy to record another fantastic milestone in their amazing story. J.J. had Will Butler, VP Community, and Alexander Hauerslev Jensen, CCO, by the scaled down Blind Bargains Suite/Room/Alcove to chat on what's happened since our July 2019 interview in Las Vegas. The trio cover topics such as the new funding announcement from last month, where they believe the Specialized Help Platform can grow in the future and the launch of their secondary "13 Letters" podcast. And keep your ears open, or scan the transcript below, to catch a Blind Bargains Qast exclusive bit of news. You can keep up with all the latest information, or join the community, by visiting the Be My Eyes website
CSUN 2020 coverage is Brought to you by AFB AccessWorld.
For the latest news and accessibility information on mainstream and access technology, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon offerings, access technology book reviews, and mobile apps, and how they can enhance entertainment, education and employment, log on to AccessWorld, the American Foundation for the Blind's free, monthly, online technology magazine. Visit www.afb.org/aw.
Transcript
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Hide transcriptTranscribed By Grecia Ramirez
Direct from Anaheim, its blindbargains.com coverage of CSUN 2020, brought to you by AFB AccessWorld.
For the latest news and accessibility information on mainstream and access technology; Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon offerings; access technology book reviews and mobile apps and how they can enhance entertainment, education, and employment, log onto AccessWorld, the American Foundation for the Blind’s free monthly online technology magazine, www.afb.org/aw.
Now, here's J.J. Meddaugh.
J.J. MEDDAUGH: CSUN 2020, here in the Blind Bargains suite -- room. And we have found Will Butler and Alexander Hauerslev Jensen from Be my Eyes back on the podcast. A lot has happened in the last year, guys. Welcome back.
WILL BUTLER: Yeah. Hey. Thank you.
ALEXANDER HAUERSLEV JENSEN: Thank you, J.J.
WB: Thanks for having us.
JM: So I guess we’ll separate the voices for our transcriptionist, Grecia. Will, go ahead and --
WB: Yeah. Will. I’m Will.
JM: That’s will.
WB: I’m will. Hi.
JM: And Alexander is –
AH: I am Alexander.
JM: There we go.
WB: The Danish accent --
AH: Yeah.
JM: He’s – he’s.
WB: -- is Alexander.
AH: You’ll pick that out easy.
WB: Yeah.
JM: There you go. Got you. Awesome. Well, congratulations, first of all. You got a bit of an investment around and some funding – more funding. One of you could talk about that and what that means for Be my Eyes.
WB: Yeah. That’s right. We’re really excited. We were excited to be able to share the news a couple weeks ago that we’ve, you know, secured some investment to keep this thing going and keep Be my Eyes free.
JM: So getting investment money for a company like Be my Eyes where, as you mentioned, the calls are free, the volunteers are plentiful – in the millions now -- what does an investment enable you, as a company, to do, and how could that really benefit you?
AH: We are – we offer a completely free service, and it’s completely unlimited in everything. The way that – what this investment has allowed us to do is to grow specialized help and also start to offer some new products. And so it’s really to ramp up our partnerships with companies. Right now, we work with the Microsofts and Googles and Procter and Gambles of the world, and we are trying to expand that list. And this is what this investment is going to help us do. So we can continue to provide a free and unlimited service to all of our users.
WB: And also do some fun, new projects.
JM: Hey. Fun, new projects, we will talk about them in a minute.
WB: Yeah.
JM: Just talk a little bit about the company structure. We were just talking about this a minute ago. It’s – obviously, you have to make a little bit of money, but it’s more than just being a for-profit company; right?
AH: Yeah. It’s – we – as you know, well, I’ve – we -- for the first few years, we didn’t have a monetization strategy. But one thing was really, really clear for us from the beginning was that Be my Eyes has to be free. We think that an assistive technology tool is only accessible if it’s also financially accessible. And our users are all over the world, so from the very first day, we were like, Be my Eyes has to be free. No matter what.
And the way that we introduced our monetization was to invite new companies to get on the platform on specialized help. It’s – this is still free for all of the users, but the companies, they pay to be on the platform to better serve their blind and low-vision customers.
JM: Let’s delve a little bit more into that, talking about the specialized help. One of the, perhaps, limitations of a service like Be my Eyes relying on volunteers is that you may not have the same level of training and skills that are available in other services. Is specialized help a way that you can overcome some of that or – and try to enable some of those services, or where do you envision that going?
AH: Yeah. We want – we’re really excited to get companies on the platform because we think that the service that you get from a company is superior to what we, as Be my Eyes group, would be able to provide and, of course, what our volunteers can provide. We work with big banks -- and you shouldn’t talk to a volunteer about your banking statements.
JM: No.
AH: So you shouldn’t talk to a third-party company about your banking things, but you can talk to your bank about your banking issues. And the same with technical issues. Who’s better to talk to your Microsoft or Google products issues than Microsoft and Google? So we invited companies to join so we can provide a service that is, like, superior to anything else.
WB: And keep the volunteers just as eyes, you know.
JM: Right.
WB: Like, not have to use their brains, and just use their eyes.
JM: What are the current numbers? I think over two million now?
WB: Oh, over.
AH: Way over.
WB: Yeah.
AH: We are at --
WB: -- three point.
AH: 3.6 million volunteers and 200 thousand blind and low-vision users.
WB: Yeah.
JM: That’s a pretty crazy ratio, 18 to 1.
AH: Yup.
JM: Yay for arithmetic. But that also creates a challenge; right? Because you have a lot of volunteers that have either never gotten a call or maybe they’ve gotten one in the year, and they’re almost a bit desperate for one; right?
WB: Believe it or not, we actually love that ratio. And as we grow, we’re going to try to maintain that ratio because the proliferation of volunteers means that the users can always get a pair of eyes quickly. Even though we ping lots of users at once, the chances that somebody’s busy at that very moment are, you know, relatively good. So we really actually like having this massive pool of volunteers to pick from because it’s what keeps it connecting really quickly -- and we can talk about connection times too.
But I also want to say, in particular, this week, we’ve been thinking about it a lot because as people become more isolated and have to do the social distancing thing, Be my Eyes use is going up, and suddenly, this massive pool of volunteers doesn’t look quite as massive as it did. And we’re like, this is -- it’s a good thing we have such an amazing cushion because we can totally serve people in times like this.
JM: That’s a really good point, especially just with everything going on and so much – people working remotely especially, there’s a lot of different challenges that weren’t even anticipated a week or two ago; right?
WB: Yeah.
AH: Absolutely. And just – you mentioned the connection time, Will. And just double-clicking on that, right now, it’s less than 30 seconds from when you tap that call button to someone picks it up at the other end.
WB: That’s across all languages.
AH: -- that’s across all languages, and I think English is less than 15 –
JM: Are you happy with that, or do you want it to still be lower?
AH: I mean, we will – of course, it’s – the idea would be to have it be instantaneously, but I think that when we are talking about a few seconds, that’s pretty close to instant support. And that’s like, 24/7.
WB: Anecdotally, I think, like, if you’re in one of our biggest markets, you’re going to – you’re talking about like a 6 to 10 second connection time. But when we average these things out, you know, for outliers, we start getting – that’s where we start getting those numbers like 15 –
JM: Sure.
WB: -- to 30 second averages. And other languages too, where there aren’t as many volunteers yet.
JM: Sure. I want to talk for a minute about privacy. It’s a conversation we’ve been having with several of our interviews and definitely think it’s fair to include you guys on it as well. What are you doing as far as maintaining privacy and integrity, as far as the recordings of calls, allowing users to either opt out of those recordings or have access to them, where is your current position on that?
WB: Well, I mean, we’re connecting people with strangers; right? So we tell people pretty clearly, don’t share anything you wouldn’t share with a stranger on the call. And then, because of trust and safety, I mean, to keep people safe on the platform, we record the calls that are going to the volunteer network, which is part of how we make sure that we keep a tight lid on abuse. And if anything, Heaven forbid, were to happen on the platform, we’d be able to solve the problem really quickly. But on the specialized help side of things, when you’re connecting with experts, when you’re talking about personal information, calls are never recorded. That’s not part of what we do. We don’t have any interest in processing people’s personal data.
JM: Do the companies themselves, can they optionally request that access? It would be the same as calling up a bank, and it says, this call is recorded for quality?
WB: I mean, that’s sort of between the company -- when we connect the user to the company, it’s -- suddenly, that’s now about the relationship between the user and the company, and it’s up to the company what they want to do with the person’s data at that point because it’s their data as well. So it’s, you know how sometimes you call your bank and it’s like, calls may be recorded for quality and training purposes, I guess? The bank could decide to do what they want with the bank data, but we don’t get involved in any of that.
JM: Okay. I ask in part because I don’t think I’ve heard any sort of message – you know, yeah. If you call a bank, you hear that, but if you call specialized help, I don’t think I’ve ever –
WB: I don’t think any of our partners --
AH: They – none of these calls are recorded.
WB: Yeah.
JM: Oh. Okay. Awesome. What’s on the horizon, as far as either specialized helps or other features that you’re looking to – that you’re thinking about over the coming months?
AH: Yeah. So like, for specialized help, you know, we’re working with several interesting companies that will be getting on. And that’s new industries. Of course, we can’t talk about this right now. But there will be some exciting news coming up. As for new projects, we are -- 2020 is going to – for us, it’s going to be a lot of -- focused on employment as well, trying to make work spaces more accessible. So making – we – working on what’s called Be my Eyes for Work –
WB: I think – is this a Blind Bargains exclusive?
JM: Do we have a sounder?
AH: No. So basically, trying to use the Be my Eyes platform to make work spaces more inclusive and more accessible.
JM: And again, going back to all the remote work, there’s a lot of potential in that area right now; right?
AH: Yeah.
JM: That’s very interesting to follow. We’ll definitely be looking for more developments as that is released for sure.
WB: Yeah. And I think since the last time we’ve talked to you, we’ve had some P and G brands come on. We had this big thing about Clearblue --
JM: Yup.
WB: -- when we announced that we’d be connecting users with pregnancy and home fertility test support. That was a huge, huge deal, and it’s being used globally now. And the response has just been incredible to allow Procter and Gamble to support the blind community while they’re working on accessible solutions. That’s been huge. National Federation of the Blind –
JM: I was going to say, NFB came on.
WB: -- has come on board.
JM: Yup.
WB: And we’d like to also, like, you know, be very clear that we’re really, like, excited about a number of human services, nonprofit, small business, and other -- really anyone who wants to support the blind community. It doesn’t have to be these behemoths like Google and Microsoft. Get in touch with us.
JM: I was going to say, we might have some small business people listening, and, you know, with Google and Microsoft being the first two, it’s very easy to get the impression that it would cost millions of dollars to be a specialized help partner.
WB: It’s a matter of what sort of – you know, what sort of service are you providing to the community and, you know, what sort of – how are you going to execute on the specialized help platform, and how are we going to insure that you’re going to be providing a quality, either support or informational service? So we’re like – I think they – anyone can just Email solutions@bemyeyes.com.
AH: Exactly.
JM: Speaking of solutions, there’s a few booths in the hall that are showing – this has been around for a few years, but there’s more modern versions of smart glasses that are out there that are providing various video services. Have you had conversations with any of those, or is that something you would consider bringing Be my Eyes to additional platforms besides the phone?
AH: We, like – hands free is something that has been requested quite a lot, and we are exploring the best ways of doing that. And one of the things that we care a lot about is, like, affordability, of course. And it is hard to find some high quality glasses at a low price point. But we are exploring. We are playing around with different hardwares till we figure out if we can find something that would work for our community at large.
JM: Do you think you would prefer, along that line, to get into someone else’s existing device and just be an option for them or to sell your own stuff?
AH: It’s – I mean, I think it’s a little too early for us to say right now. It’s quality and affordability. That's just what we care about. And it’s been really hard to find that combination, maybe for good reasons. Maybe it’s just a question of that technology maturing a little bit. But we are actively exploring and figuring it out. And whether that’s going to be on our own or someone else’s, we – I – we don’t know yet.
WB: Yeah. If we get into a piece of hardware, we want it to be financially accessible and long-term sustainable.
JM: Right. That makes a lot of sense. How big is the company these days?
AH: We –
WB: 17 –
AH: 17? Yeah.
WB: Yeah.
JM: Wow.
AH: Yeah.
WB: Yeah. We just hired some great folks in the U.S., which I’m excited about because I’m not as lonely anymore. The folks like Kelly Egan and Todd Kipers and Joe Weber, you know, they’re wonderful team, and they’re helping us spread the word about specialized help and figure out how we can provide the most value to blind consumers on that platform.
JM: Great. Well, cool. Certainly lots of developments and things going on, and I know we’re going to have more conversations in, probably, very near future about some of the new things that the investment money and everything else is enabling, so –
Thank you so much for coming on as always. Of course, if people want to get ahold of you all, bemyeyes.com.
WB: Yeah.
AH: Yeah.
WB: And we want to hear from people about, like -- you know, believe it or not, like, we basically respond to your feedback when it comes to which specialized help partners we talk to. So tell us what you want to see. If you’re like, I really need support with my cable TV box, let us know. You know, write us a little paragraph or just – even better yet, just go on social media and just start making a racket, you know, because that’s really – at the end of the day, that’s what creates change. It’s not companies like us running around trying to sell people on stuff. It’s real users talking about what they really want. That’s what companies now listen to.
JM: Okay. Before we go, you launched another podcast?
AH: One is not enough, J.J.
JM: Don’t tell that to Joe.
WB: Yeah. Yeah. In addition – yeah. So we have the Be my Eyes podcast, which is just our blindness podcast; right? It’s just interviews with blind people. And that’s like, now in its 20th episode or something. But last month – in February, on February 13th, we launched 13 Letters, the Accessibility Podcast, which is myself –
JM: Which is 13 letters?
WB: Yeah.
JM: There you go.
WB: That’s right. It’s kind of a jab at the A11Y –
JM: I like it.
WB: But it’s – you know, it’s not just about digital accessibility, it’s about physical accessibility, inclusive design, more broadly. And it’s hosted by me and Cordelia McGee Tub, who’s a lead accessibility engineer at Salesforce.
JM: Oh, wow.
WB: Yeah. And it’s a really fun podcast. We talk to, like, some real originators in, like, digital accessibility and physical accessibility areas. People like the guy who is responsible for VoiceOver, and, you know, Lainey Feingold, who’s responsible for some major, major web accessibility settlements and agreements. So it’s a really, really great resource for anyone who’s interested in accessibility broadly.
JM: So you’re going to keep the other one going as well then?
WB: Absolutely. Yeah. We’re having too much fun to stop.
AH: Mm-hmm. Right? One is not enough, JJ. We need another one.
JM: So when is your third one? All right.
WB: Just wait.
JM: All right. Thank you both so much for coming on. I really do appreciate it.
WB: Awe. Thank you.
AH: Thank you so much, J.J.
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Joe Steinkamp is no stranger to the world of technology, having been a user of video magnification and blindness related electronic devices since 1979. Joe has worked in radio, retail management and Vocational Rehabilitation for blind and low vision individuals in Texas. He has been writing about the A.T. Industry for 15 years and podcasting about it for almost a decade.
