SpeechTrans Offers Mobile Translation App for Hearing Impaired
SpeechTrans, a provider of app-based multi-language translation, announced today the launch of SpeechTrans Ultimate for Hearing Impaired. The new app enables the hearing impaired to conduct real-time two-way conversations in English, Spanish, French, Japanese, Italian, German, and Mandarin Chinese without the need for sign language or an in-person translator.
With the new app, each person can simply speak out loud into the user's mobile device, and have the translated text automatically appear. Type-to-type translations are also available for situations that require quiet, or for those who have trouble speaking because of disability. It is difficult for hearing impaired individuals to determine when someone ends their part of the conversation, so the Hearing Impaired version can automatically detect when a person stops speaking, and immediately begin the translation.
The app stores and can play back previous translations, without access to an internet connection. In this version the auto-translate feature can be turned off, allowing same language conversations. Information from other apps can also be cut and pasted into SpeechTrans, so it can be translated and read aloud to another individual.
SpeechTrans Ultimate for Hearing Impaired features Facebook chat integration, which allows users to type in their native language and have the other party receive translated output on the SpeechTrans-enabled iPhone or iPad, or directly as text on a computer.
The development of the hearing impaired version was prompted by a SpeechTrans customer in Spain who described the usefulness of such a product. The unique functionalities of SpeechTrans Ultimate for Hearing Impaired were built based upon direct feedback from hearing impaired users who provided guidance on needed features.
"For hearing-impaired individuals, the internet becomes such a huge part of their world, and is especially important for communication," said Yan Auerbach, co-founder of SpeechTrans. "With our new Hearing Impaired version, we are using the power of technology to enable richer in-person conversations across language barriers. Unlike other expensive translation products that only offer text-to-speech translation, we provide a more organic conversation at a fraction of the cost."
The Hearing Impaired app comes with 1,000 pre-loaded transcriptions that never expire, compared to 400 available in the SpeechTrans Ultimate app. Every usage of the app that requires voice recognition counts as one "transcription." Text-to-text and text-to-speech transcriptions are unlimited. An additional 100 transcriptions are available to users of Facebook's "Suggest Friends" feature within the app.
Pricing for the SpeechTrans Ultimate Hearing Impaired app is $99, and the app is currently available in Apple's App Store.
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