How Technology Is Besting My Blindness

I have a genetic condition called retinitis

a

pigmentosa, which is causing my sight to deteriorate over time until there will be little, or possibly nothing, left. Even now I can’t see in the dark and have almost no peripheral vision. As my taxi sped through Shanghai, I couldn’t read the street signs or building numbers. After the sun began to set, it became difficult to tell one street from the next. And I couldn’t read the taxi meter. I’ve gotten ripped off before by unscrupulous cabbies, and I prefer not to rely on them to tell me how much I owe.


So that night I experimented with some technology. I have an app on my iPad that transforms the camera into a powerful magnifier. I use it mainly to read small text on business cards and restaurant menus. Could it help me see the taxi meter, all the way from the back seat? I aimed the iPad at where I thought the meter might be, tapped on the app, and zoomed in. There was the fare—bright, large, and clear enough on my screen to read. Disaster averted.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-19/how-technology-is-besting-my-blindness