Mission Impact
Why we matter
One of the Foundation’s key beneficiaries is Be My Eyes, which has operated its network since 2015, and we’re blown away by how blind people use it. Like checking their child’s school reports. Or seeing why the office printer isn’t printing. Or simply having social media photos described. The list is endless and affecting.
Our mission
Our mission is to develop and accelerate the pace of ideating, creating, and distributing technologies whose effect will be transformative in the way blind people live, study, work or play — and to keep them free for everyone who needs them.
We wish to relentlessly design, acquire or adapt technologies to make the world more accessible to blind people in all aspects of life. Founded in 2026, the Be My Eyes Foundation is in the process of assembling its Board of Directors and establishing an initial Founder’s Fund to spur user expansion and permanently honor the first farsighted companies who share our vision. The opportunity is enormous – serving another 50 million blind people means a 50x increase beyond the 1 million blind users already reached through the Be My Eyes app. It’s a challenge the new Foundation relishes.
The Be My Eyes network
The Be My Eyes volunteer network is the world’s largest digital volunteer network. But that’s only the beginning.
The Foundation supports work to provide the latest AI descriptions directly to blind people, through their phone or, more recently, smart glasses. In an instant a blind person can read a label, a work memo, or learn about the landscape she is facing. This year alone blind people have asked for AI descriptions of their world 100 million times. And their usage is growing exponentially.
Be My Eyes leverages its relationships with OpenAI, Microsoft, Meta and others, supporting the advancement of free, accessible technologies worldwide.
Be My Eyes and OpenAI
The Be My AI feature from Be My Eyes – built with OpenAI – gives blind and low-vision people all over the world the option to get visual descriptions quickly, efficiently and completely privately.
Sam Altman from OpenAI gave a huge shout out to
Be My Eyes, noting the app as an example of the power of their visual model.
How You Can Make a Difference
To design new accessible apps, to engineer worldwide audio and video communications, and to pay for the cloud computing power to describe the world isn’t free. That’s why the Foundation is seeking your support. So that blind people of all nations can always, privately and independently, have their world described and accessible.
If you have had a chance to take a call from a blind person, or have blind friends, relatives or co-workers, you know what a difference a few moments of description can make. Today, blind people use this technology at work, in school and at play. For tomorrow, the Foundation is seeking support to build dozens of new services and features whose effect on blind people’s lives will be transformative.
If you are moved by the importance of bending technology toward humanistic purposes, won’t you consider a gift today to the Be My Eyes Foundation? Click here to support blind people’s access today.
And if you know a public-spirited corporation, philanthropist or foundation who may be a supporter, please send a quick note to Bryan Bashin, President, Be My Eyes Foundation at [email protected].
Thank you for helping make accessibility a true human right.
