{"id":266603,"date":"2020-01-28T07:00:44","date_gmt":"2020-01-28T10:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/?p=266603"},"modified":"2020-01-28T13:01:14","modified_gmt":"2020-01-28T16:01:14","slug":"the-voice-created-by-a-brazilian-with-expo-2020-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/the-voice-created-by-a-brazilian-with-expo-2020-support\/","title":{"rendered":"The voice created by a Brazilian with Expo 2020 support"},"content":{"rendered":"

S\u00e3o Paulo \u2013 Giving voice to his life cause drove Fernando Botelho to apply for a grant of Expo Life, the social-environmental branch of Expo Dubai 2020. He is the only Brazilian to be selected by the program so far, and the result was \u2018Let\u00edcia<\/a>,\u2019 an artificial voice that makes technology accessible to the visually impaired.<\/p>\n

And the Brazilian resum\u00e9 is extensive. Botelho has worked in New York, Zurich, and Geneva. He himself is visually impaired and is a social entrepreneur in a consulting firm he created, F123<\/a>. \u201cWe already had the idea to develop a low-cost, high-quality voice. It\u2019s not easy to find financial support for such innovation projects, especially since it wouldn\u2019t make any money, so we had the idea but hadn\u2019t started implementing it. When the opportunity arose, we thought it would be great, explained he, who was approved two years ago in Expo Live selection process for social entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n

The free technology consists of a screen reader software. It\u2019s an assistive technology, which provides more accessibility in day-to-day activities such as a wheelchair. \u201cMost screen readers are for people who can\u2019t see. It\u2019s a different way to perform the same activities. We focused in a project that improved access to low-cost software, we wanted to offer it freely. The team is me, my wife and several others from seven different countries. Most of the them are blind people developing software or doing translations,\u201d Botelho said.<\/p>\n

The app was launched in September 2019, but without a marketing budget, it\u2019s still spread via mouth-to-mouth, relying heavily on the shares of users. The instructions to install the app are on this webpage<\/a> of the 123 site. The voice features 3,300 phrases in over nine hours of high-quality recordings. And to achieve a product that wasn\u2019t robotic but natural, a singer lent her voice to the app. The technology is even named after her, who\u2019s called Sara Let\u00edcia and is visually impaired too.<\/p>\n

The core of team was entirely composed by blind people: a software developer, a linguistics expert and Botelho himself, who managed the processes. The voices work both in cellphones and computers.<\/p>\n

Botelho still doesn\u2019t know how the Expo Live grantees will participate during Expo 2020 in Dubai. \u201cWe\u2019re the first project from Brazil they\u2019ve supported. They are raising awareness and I hope we have more projects. It\u2019s still being organized, being determined if we\u2019re doing a Ted-Talk style presentation or demo or offering workshops to teach blind children to set up their own computer,\u201d he pointed out.<\/p>\n

A sociologist with a master\u2019s in International Relations, Botelho has worked in developing low-cost technology for the visually impaired since 2007. \u201cI lived abroad for a long time. I found that every disabled person has a great potential, but it\u2019s not fulfilled for lack of proper technology. I\u2019ve always regarded myself as a privileged person because my parents [had some money], but many people in developing countries don\u2019t have that kind of access. I wanted to do a project to improve this access since 80% of the disabled live in developing countries,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

During his career, he had led in New York the development of eSightCareers, the world\u2019s first web service focused on job opportunities for the visually impaired. And now, besides \u2018Let\u00edcia,\u2019 he\u2019s developing other two projects with Expo 2020 support. \u201cI\u2019ve always dedicated myself to technology for the blind. And I don\u2019t plan to stop. We don\u2019t know what the future will bring, but as long as there\u2019s a chance to help in this, I want to keep going,\u201d he finished.<\/p>\n

Watch below a video where the Brazilian talks about the project:<\/p>\n