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Honestly, most people whose hearing losses are mild enough that vanity outweighs sheer need in their decision making have hearing losses that can be helped with
by solatic 6y ago
Honestly, most people whose hearing losses are mild enough that vanity outweighs sheer need in their decision making have hearing losses that can be helped with a hearing aid that fits completely within the ear canal. These are effectively invisible (it takes a trained eye to spot them), even many hearing aids that fit behind the ear are now small enough with a thin enough wire leading into the ear canal that they are quite often simply missed by most people.
The real issue is cost. The cost issue persists despite of attempts to address cost concerns by granting people 30-day trials with full refunds if they decide to return the hearing aids, i.e. decide that the cost is not worth it. Convincing people to drop four figures on something that, by virtue of making the free and independent decision to purchase it, labels them as somebody with a disability is a hard sell. Able-bodied people don't want to give themselves the "disability" label. That's true regardless of how stylish the hearing aid is.
The situation won't change until there is greater media representation of people open with their hearing loss, living full and capable lives, to change the perception of a hearing aid to be less like a walking cane and more like vision glasses.
- leoedin 6y agoThe other way hearing aids will become widely acceptable is by the normalisation of wearing them by everyone. Which is already happening. The hardware in an Airpod is effectively the same as that in a hearing aid. Wearing an Airpod isn't a sign of a disability, with all the stigma that comes attached to that. Something like these earrings blur the line even more between hearing aid and headphone. You could actually imagine wearing it all the time (including during conversations) without appearing rude - a big problem with just wearing earbuds. The only thing missing is the software to do local DSP and amplification. It's almost certainly possible - bluetooth headphones have all the required components - but the manufacturers aren't writing the software to amplify ambient noise directly. Either because they don't believe the market is there or because they don't want to venture into the "medical devices" category that hearing aids land in, with all the added R&D expense that entails.
- Aurum197 6y agoYou are absolutely right. The distinction between hearing aids and hearables is blurring. We would definitely like to be in that space down the road.
- Aurum197 6y agoAn "easy" solution then is for hearing aids to look like earbuds; that would normalize hearing aid; but then if you have to spend $5K on them, do you really want them to look like everyday earbuds? Quandary!
- solatic 6y agoNot exactly, because it's less socially acceptable to wear AirPods in meetings and other group conversation settings, especially if people think that you're wearing them because you're actually hearing something from them. Many / most people put away their AirPods when they're in such settings, but it's exactly in those settings when people with hearing loss need their hearing aids the most.
- Aurum197 6y agoYes, I agree. We made our SmartEarrings™ for situations where AirPods and earbuds are not socially acceptable. And yet, in discussing hearing aids, I forgot that AirPods-as-hearing aids won't work precisely for that reason: the social cost of wearing hearables in meetings.