That said, I doubt one could go at it alone with no support or with only a grant -- building up mind share, fighting off BS patent threats, and doing enough sales to break even on these non-development costs aren't the sort of things that a government/ngo grant will typically support. And even if you could find the money, you'll still need access to a network of experts.
Someone should setup a fund that force-multiplies government/NGO grants for societally beneifical OSS with funding and access to expertise for these other things (legal/marketing/etc.). The aim could just be breaking even on non-grant-funded costs by selling support/branding/etc. to institutional players like hospitals and large chains.
I mentioned Owls above. You wont believe what it is... just clipart in a nice easel book form. I'm not joking, its just page after page of clipart, accompanied by a manual and 20 page copyright warning booklet.
The thing is Pearson has convinced governments, schools, charities, hospitals etc that this system is the best way to diagnose speech issues. My wife and a lot of her colleagues would beg to differ.
The best way to improve the status quo on a case-by-case basis is to introduce competition, say by developing a better product, marketing it well, and basically out-predating the theretofore market predators. The marketing is easy if you can get enough momentum behind it:
“FooCorp wants to sell you these materials for $absurd. We made these better alternative materials. You can print the basic set yourself for free, or order any of our wide, high-quality selection, starting from $reasonable.”
I don’t think there is a general solution to the underlying cause, though.
This is exactly the kind of thing I'd love to see China come in and drive the price down to commodity levels on.
The therapy involves getting patients to shout in a certain way and try and reach certain volume levels or follow certain volume patterns. E.g. shout gently for five seconds and gradually ramp up the volume over 10 seconds.
It would be really easy to replicate. I reckon the most time consuming part would be testing and calibration.
The whole app directory is less than 2MB.
But you should look into Max/MSP ( https://cycling74.com/products/max/ ), where you could build and bundle a simple audio app like that in minutes and have it tailored to your specific needs.
There are other settings more under the preferences category than DSP, like what profiles go on what switch setting, beeps, things like that. But these are all guarded jealously.
The aids are very expensive, more than $5k, for what's now ancient tech. They've only recently gotten BT and only then at the high end, more like $8k for the BT models.
We really need open hardware and software, so home users can get an audiologist to compute their profile and then do what they want with it.
But, she can hear, and she’s happy. I guess that’s how these companies get away with it—you can satisfy a customer without doing a whole lot of actual good for them.
My father who is in the age group now pretty much confirmed all of this when recently shopping for one. As it was covered by his health care they were trying to flog him one at a ridiculous price.
Is this a common thing? I would absolutely love to be funded to work on a bespoke open source project for such a good cause.
I have another friend from college who works in a hospital and makes 70-80k. Although there isn't much increase over the years in a hospital.
Just curious because I'm familiar with the field. Are things different in Europe?
Edit: A common problem in her sector, and other therapy sectors, is that all the recognised diagnosis and treatment systems get bought by the likes of Pearson and other big technical publishers who will demand recurring payments to use the system. For example Owls, a common speech therapy system requires her to use their pre-printed forms to take notes. The basic diagnosis pack costs over $700, but she has to keep buying the forms at $60 for 25 - even thought he system rarely changes.