Whilst playing with the Facebook Portal 'Mini' videoconferencing screens recently I stumbled across a feature that I though could (if available / developed) help people who were hearing impaired video conference (other than signing etc), particularly between someone who wasn't also hearing impaired (for reasons that may become apparent later).
Eg, If whilst in a video conference you want to clear the call using voice commands (you don't have to), you say 'Hey Portal' and if it heard / understood you you get a white line along the bottom of the screen as an indicator that it's awaiting your command. This would typically be 'End Call' or 'Menu' etc.
However, whilst doing that I've noticed how fast the voice recognition / correction takes place and I'd say it was pretty well real time ... and I thought 'if only that could be transmitted on-screen to the other end, someone hard of hearing / deaf could read when you had said and reply (voice).
Now a specific scenario is a mates Mum who is profoundly deaf and uses one of those text phone devices (that seem hugely clumsy) but can communicate with you if you write stuff on a whiteboard (something our daughter set up). Because she lost her hearing with old age, her speech is still very clear / audible etc.
I did something similar to what I just described when we went out for a meal with her a while back. I was sitting opposite her and I found an app on my phone that did real time voice recognition and left the text on the screen. I would talk a question into my phone then show her the screen 'How is your dinner?' and the like. We were having quite a chat. ;-) (My mum was also there and having a hard time of it with her hearing aids).
There is probably something out there that does the above (Videoconferencing with real time displayed voice recognition) already and if so, I'd be interested to hear about it?
Cheers, T i m