Thanks for watching! Have a question about my life as a blind person? Leave a comment! No query is too dumb, and I'll be happy to answer all your questions. 😆
Thanks for watching! And glad you found the video informative. Yes, accessibility is so important, and I'm glad I can be a starting point for the conversation developers can have surrounding making software accessible. This is a topic I hope to cover more often in the coming months so stay tuned!
Thanks for watching! Haha yes I've often encountered people who are amazed at the talking speed, but I've actually met other people who use even faster speeds! Also, what you described about learning how to use a computer without seeing the screen is a video I'm currently working on. I'm going to try to make a fun "guide" that shows off the actual techniques blind people like me use.
Great video! I remember many years ago in elementary school briefly learning how blind people live. No mention of using computers but that was the 90s and early 2000s (I'm 30 years old). I finally decided to look up how visual impaired people use computers and I'm also now going to try learning how to use the "TalkBack" on my phone. Do you also edit your videos yourself?
Wow you had a really progressive elementary school! Yes screen readers existed back in the 90s but it took a long time for them to really become accessible to most blind people do to factors like cost. Using screen readers like TalkBack definitely come with a learning curve, and TalkBack in particular is somewhat slow compared to VoiceOver on iOS. Still, it can be a fun experiment. Finally, nope I don't edit my own videos, I have editors who help me. Thanks for the support, glad you enjoyed the video!
Thanks Elliot! And haha truthfully I didn't plan too far ahead which websites I was going to show and just showed Twitter because I had it opened. If I had planned further ahead I probably would've visited someone's profile to give them a shoutout. 😂 Glad you enjoyed the video too! The next one uses tech in a somewhat unexpected way: it's related to how I find my clothes.
Awesome video! I have been totally blind since birth. I also have my voiceover on the iPhone at a fast speaking rate, and people at my school tell me it sounds like it's speaking another language! Lol! 😂
Thanks for watching! And haha yes it's especially a blast when they get very invested in trying to guess what the screen reader is saying but get frustrated yet amazed when they fail repeatedly. I've only had 1 sighted person ever be able to accurately understand what VoiceOver was saying at 100% speed. He used to be an audio engineer, which probably explains his keen hearing, but everyone was extremely impressed (me included).
@@JoshTseng I have voiceover at 90%, and I don't know about you, but it drives me nuts whenever I have to slow it down for a sighted person if I want them to hear something. I'm just used to it at a faster speed.
@@hopemcmann8159 Haha yes I can definitely relate. I don't mind doing a demo to educate people or to have a little party trick but sometimes, let's just say people get a bit overly enthusiastic. 😂
Great video. However, I would have either done a screen video so that the speech could come out much louder and clearer to the listener, or hook your iPhone up to some speakers. I could understand VoiceOver just fine, but someone who is completely new would struggle, especially if you are looking to give the viewer a full experience. And also, you had the music playing in the background. When you demonstrated JAWS, The speech was a lot closer and clear. I would also say that text to speech is a component of a screen reader, but actually isn't. I know that sounds kind of weird, but to the uninformed, saying that the screen reader is also known as text to speech can be really confusing. For example in iOS, if you highlight text and have it read back to you, that is text to speech but VoiceOver isn't on. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just suggesting another way to explain to the very uninformed. I have had people tell me they know exactly what a screen reader is because they use the speak highlighted text feature. In the end, us users know what we're talking about, but most people don't. Hence I make the distinction. I like eloquence a lot. I wish it was available on the Apple platforms. Well, I guess I technically could make that happen by jailbreaking, but considering my work is Apple oriented and I am a bit of a purist, that's not going to happen. My favorite speech synthesizer of all time even now though is DecTalk. You could do all kinds of really cool things with it including making it sing.
Thanks Khanh for the honest feedback! Yes after reviewing my recording session I realised the VoiceOver speech didn't come out as clearly as I had hoped, and am looking into how to resolve the issue next time I demonstrate anything on a phone or iPad. Currently I'm a little constrained on the technical side and will have to invest in some software and other equipment to help me do this in the future. Also my Lightning port on my phone wasn't working so I was definitely quite ill-prepared haha As for the difference in the terminology between "screen readers" and "text to speech", that's part of my communication to the general public I've never considered. You're definitely right that there's a difference that most people don't appreciate. Maybe clarifying that screen readers "use technologies including text to speech and translation layers to allow us to interact with text elements on a screen". That's slightly wordy and jargon-heavy but I'll find a way to refine it! Overall, I'll just have to learn from this experience so I can make better videos in the future. As for Eloquence, yes it's absolutely the best for anything productivity-related. I actually find the synthesisers on the Mac quite natural-sounding, but once you speed them up then understandability falls apart. I find the American Siri Female voice on iOS works the best when sped up. Your off-handed comment about jailbreaking Apple devices to load Eloquence is giving me an idea for a tech-y video though, I think that might be cool to cover (though maybe on a different channel from this one). And yes I've heard of DecTalk but never tried it. I should try playing around with it to make it sing, that'll be an entertaining experience if it isn't too hard.
@@JoshTseng Sorry Josh, I just saw your comment. I'm frantically trying to catch up. Let's see if I succeed. ::Snort:: I hear you about being constrained on the technical side. As a thought for future videos until you can get whatever software/equipment you need, if you are going to demonstrate something on your iPhone, say, what about screen recording that portion? Your audience would not see you, but they would see your screen as well as hear the speech. Sometimes seeing what's on the screen and hearing it at the same time helps sighties understand better. And then record the rest of the video, and stitching it together during the post production process? I had a concise explanation about screen readers and text to speech, but it went out of my head, so if I remember it, I'll come back and comment. Have too many things I'm thinking about.
@@khanhhm5762 Haha Khanh after I found out about TH-cam Studio not showing me the replies, I guess I now know we're both catching up with this reply stuff! I still can't believe I've literally missed weeks of you replying to my comments just because my app doesn't easily show comment replies for some weird reason. As for your explanation on how to screen record to make the iPhone screen reader portion easier to understand... I'll be honest, I wonder why I didn't think of that. I was really focused on capturing my voice so it wasn't just VoiceOver talking without my verbal explanation (since iOS does not allow you to record both on-board audio and microphone audio at the same time), but now I realise I could've recorded a voice over narration on top of the footage after the fact. It wouldn't be live, but it wouldn't have been difficult. I think I was way too focused on doing everything in the single video take so I could show my live usage of the phone and capturing my reactions. This is a major brain fart. 😂 Really goes to show how much I still have to learn. Thanks Khanh so much for your feedback and helping me realise this oversight! About the explanation on what screen readers are, I think I did come up with a fairly concise explanation about what they do when I was formulating my TEDx talk (that I just gave yesterday as of this comment, actually). I had a one-paragraph bit that ended by saying "On a phone, a screen reader tells me verbally what an element is when I touch it, and then I can interact with it using gestures, swipes, and taps."
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Thanks for watching! Have a question about my life as a blind person? Leave a comment!
No query is too dumb, and I'll be happy to answer all your questions. 😆
Learned a lot as a software engineer! Now want to take it way more seriously for the products I build.
Thanks for watching! And glad you found the video informative. Yes, accessibility is so important, and I'm glad I can be a starting point for the conversation developers can have surrounding making software accessible.
This is a topic I hope to cover more often in the coming months so stay tuned!
I think it’s amazing that you can get used to listening that fast. I’ve thought of learning to use devices as if I was blind to see what it’s like.
Thanks for watching! Haha yes I've often encountered people who are amazed at the talking speed, but I've actually met other people who use even faster speeds!
Also, what you described about learning how to use a computer without seeing the screen is a video I'm currently working on. I'm going to try to make a fun "guide" that shows off the actual techniques blind people like me use.
Great video! I remember many years ago in elementary school briefly learning how blind people live. No mention of using computers but that was the 90s and early 2000s (I'm 30 years old). I finally decided to look up how visual impaired people use computers and I'm also now going to try learning how to use the "TalkBack" on my phone. Do you also edit your videos yourself?
Wow you had a really progressive elementary school! Yes screen readers existed back in the 90s but it took a long time for them to really become accessible to most blind people do to factors like cost.
Using screen readers like TalkBack definitely come with a learning curve, and TalkBack in particular is somewhat slow compared to VoiceOver on iOS. Still, it can be a fun experiment.
Finally, nope I don't edit my own videos, I have editors who help me. Thanks for the support, glad you enjoyed the video!
Great video Josh. I love seeing how you use technology like this. I was so close to getting a Twitter shoutout too haha. Keep up the good work!
Thanks Elliot! And haha truthfully I didn't plan too far ahead which websites I was going to show and just showed Twitter because I had it opened. If I had planned further ahead I probably would've visited someone's profile to give them a shoutout. 😂
Glad you enjoyed the video too! The next one uses tech in a somewhat unexpected way: it's related to how I find my clothes.
Awesome video! I have been totally blind since birth. I also have my voiceover on the iPhone at a fast speaking rate, and people at my school tell me it sounds like it's speaking another language! Lol! 😂
Thanks for watching! And haha yes it's especially a blast when they get very invested in trying to guess what the screen reader is saying but get frustrated yet amazed when they fail repeatedly.
I've only had 1 sighted person ever be able to accurately understand what VoiceOver was saying at 100% speed. He used to be an audio engineer, which probably explains his keen hearing, but everyone was extremely impressed (me included).
@@JoshTseng I have voiceover at 90%, and I don't know about you, but it drives me nuts whenever I have to slow it down for a sighted person if I want them to hear something. I'm just used to it at a faster speed.
@@hopemcmann8159 Haha yes I can definitely relate. I don't mind doing a demo to educate people or to have a little party trick but sometimes, let's just say people get a bit overly enthusiastic. 😂
Amazing Video!! Thank you so much for all the information :D
No problem! Glad you found a video helpful, and thanks for watching.
Great video. However, I would have either done a screen video so that the speech could come out much louder and clearer to the listener, or hook your iPhone up to some speakers. I could understand VoiceOver just fine, but someone who is completely new would struggle, especially if you are looking to give the viewer a full experience. And also, you had the music playing in the background. When you demonstrated JAWS, The speech was a lot closer and clear.
I would also say that text to speech is a component of a screen reader, but actually isn't. I know that sounds kind of weird, but to the uninformed, saying that the screen reader is also known as text to speech can be really confusing. For example in iOS, if you highlight text and have it read back to you, that is text to speech but VoiceOver isn't on. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just suggesting another way to explain to the very uninformed. I have had people tell me they know exactly what a screen reader is because they use the speak highlighted text feature. In the end, us users know what we're talking about, but most people don't. Hence I make the distinction.
I like eloquence a lot. I wish it was available on the Apple platforms. Well, I guess I technically could make that happen by jailbreaking, but considering my work is Apple oriented and I am a bit of a purist, that's not going to happen.
My favorite speech synthesizer of all time even now though is DecTalk. You could do all kinds of really cool things with it including making it sing.
Thanks Khanh for the honest feedback! Yes after reviewing my recording session I realised the VoiceOver speech didn't come out as clearly as I had hoped, and am looking into how to resolve the issue next time I demonstrate anything on a phone or iPad. Currently I'm a little constrained on the technical side and will have to invest in some software and other equipment to help me do this in the future. Also my Lightning port on my phone wasn't working so I was definitely quite ill-prepared haha
As for the difference in the terminology between "screen readers" and "text to speech", that's part of my communication to the general public I've never considered. You're definitely right that there's a difference that most people don't appreciate. Maybe clarifying that screen readers "use technologies including text to speech and translation layers to allow us to interact with text elements on a screen". That's slightly wordy and jargon-heavy but I'll find a way to refine it!
Overall, I'll just have to learn from this experience so I can make better videos in the future.
As for Eloquence, yes it's absolutely the best for anything productivity-related. I actually find the synthesisers on the Mac quite natural-sounding, but once you speed them up then understandability falls apart. I find the American Siri Female voice on iOS works the best when sped up.
Your off-handed comment about jailbreaking Apple devices to load Eloquence is giving me an idea for a tech-y video though, I think that might be cool to cover (though maybe on a different channel from this one).
And yes I've heard of DecTalk but never tried it. I should try playing around with it to make it sing, that'll be an entertaining experience if it isn't too hard.
@@JoshTseng Sorry Josh, I just saw your comment. I'm frantically trying to catch up. Let's see if I succeed. ::Snort::
I hear you about being constrained on the technical side. As a thought for future videos until you can get whatever software/equipment you need, if you are going to demonstrate something on your iPhone, say, what about screen recording that portion? Your audience would not see you, but they would see your screen as well as hear the speech. Sometimes seeing what's on the screen and hearing it at the same time helps sighties understand better. And then record the rest of the video, and stitching it together during the post production process?
I had a concise explanation about screen readers and text to speech, but it went out of my head, so if I remember it, I'll come back and comment. Have too many things I'm thinking about.
@@khanhhm5762 Haha Khanh after I found out about TH-cam Studio not showing me the replies, I guess I now know we're both catching up with this reply stuff! I still can't believe I've literally missed weeks of you replying to my comments just because my app doesn't easily show comment replies for some weird reason.
As for your explanation on how to screen record to make the iPhone screen reader portion easier to understand... I'll be honest, I wonder why I didn't think of that. I was really focused on capturing my voice so it wasn't just VoiceOver talking without my verbal explanation (since iOS does not allow you to record both on-board audio and microphone audio at the same time), but now I realise I could've recorded a voice over narration on top of the footage after the fact. It wouldn't be live, but it wouldn't have been difficult.
I think I was way too focused on doing everything in the single video take so I could show my live usage of the phone and capturing my reactions. This is a major brain fart. 😂
Really goes to show how much I still have to learn. Thanks Khanh so much for your feedback and helping me realise this oversight!
About the explanation on what screen readers are, I think I did come up with a fairly concise explanation about what they do when I was formulating my TEDx talk (that I just gave yesterday as of this comment, actually). I had a one-paragraph bit that ended by saying "On a phone, a screen reader tells me verbally what an element is when I touch it, and then I can interact with it using gestures, swipes, and taps."