Microsoft's AI-powered iOS app tells the blind what's around them

Microsoft hast just launched Seeing AI, an iOS app that it appropriately describes as a'talking camera for the blind'; I've been giving it a whirl this morning and it's actually pretty impressive. Fire up the free app and point your iPhone at anything, whether it's a document, a menu card, a room or even a friend, and Seeing AI will tell you what it is with its voice. I tried it on a bunch of objects and spaces, and the app was astonishingly quick and accurate for the most part. It managed to recognize a guitar, identified me by my face and told me just how far away I was, and even described my living room and shower with some basic details. It was also able to read out the blurb of a book and the ingredients on a ramen packet, and even identified the contents of a photo I sent to the app from the share sheet in Twitter.