Microsoft News
2nd December 2019
Bonjour! ¡Bienvenidos! Seeing AI expands to 5 new languages - Stories
Suzanne Choney By Suzanne Choney
Akiko Ishii was referred to a job training program where she hoped to learn how to use a computer and work in an office. Instead, she was told she should probably study to be a massage therapist, that it would be a good profession for someone like her – someone who was blind. Ishii was having none of that.
Newly blind following a surgery at age 30, Ishii was determined to achieve her goals. That determination paid off with a job in the human relations department of an IT company in Tokyo. Now, she and her husband have a company that gives classes ranging from yoga to technology know-how for people who are blind or have low vision.
Ishii manages a very full life, and in recent years has been able to do it more easily with her “assistant,” as she calls Seeing AI, the free Microsoft app for iOS for those who are blind or who have low vision.