Cheonan City Faces Controversy Over Adoption of Official Document Voice Conversion App with Poorer Performance Than Free Versions

Introducing VoiceEye at a Cost of 35 Million Won
Requires a Hard-to-Recognize Dedicated Code... Limited Features

Voice Eye Implementation Service Notice. (Provided by Cheonan City)

From the left, Google Lens (Vietnamese), Voice Eye (English) operating screens.

Cheonan City in South Chungcheong Province will invest 35 million won starting from the 1st of next month to introduce a public document voice conversion app, which is evaluated to have lower performance compared to free private apps.

On the 31st, the city announced through a press release that it will introduce VoiceEye, a public document voice conversion service for people with low vision or foreigners.

According to a direct test by Asia Economy, this app was found to be somewhat inferior in performance compared to the free app "Google Lens," which is frequently used for overseas travel and other purposes.

In fact, Google Lens allows immediate voice output through the "Listen" function after taking a picture of a screen or document, but VoiceEye requires scanning a dedicated code similar to a QR code.

There was also an issue with recognizing the dedicated code. When tested with the Cheonan Sarang Newsletter, which had the code attached, the code could not be scanned online no matter how much the camera was moved back and forth, and scanning was only successful when the camera was brought directly to the printed material.

While the translation functions of both apps showed similar performance, there was a difference in the reading aloud feature.

Both Google Lens and VoiceEye require users to download a language pack to use languages other than Korean and English.

With Google Lens, the download button is activated when selecting a language, allowing users to use the reading aloud function after translation.

On the other hand, with VoiceEye, when selecting a language other than Korean or English, translation is possible but the reading aloud function is disabled.

Regarding this, a city official explained, "The reading aloud function works properly once the language pack is downloaded," but the language pack could not be found on Google Play Store, Google, Naver, Daum, or even the developer's website.

As a result, foreigners with low vision who use languages other than English are limited in their use of VoiceEye.

However, there are also advantages to VoiceEye. The location of the dedicated code is standardized to be marked at the top right, allowing users to scan the document by touch, and a notification sound is played when scanning.

Meanwhile, the city plans to provide guidance on how to use the service through senior welfare centers, welfare centers for the disabled, and multicultural support centers, and to strengthen its promotional efforts.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.