Customer Experience

AI digital signage robot keeps museum running during COVID-19

November 13, 2020 by Elliot Maras — Editor, Kiosk Marketplace & Vending Times

Editor's note: This is part two in a two-part series on an AI powered robot employed by the Ontario Regiment Museum.

When the Ontario Regiment Museum closed to visitors in March because of COVID-19, the staff was grateful for the services of Master Corporal Lana, an artificially intelligent virtual assistant designed for human interaction. While the original goal for Lana was to check in visitors and give them directions on where to find things in the museum, when COVID-19 hit, those plans got put on hold. Instead of greeting and checking in visitors, the staff needed Lana to handle a new task — checking the temperatures of the museum's volunteers.

When the museum, located in Oshawa, a 45-minute drive from Toronto to the west. closed to the public, volunteers still had to perform maintenance on the tanks and artifacts until the building reopened, as described in part one of this two-part series. Hence, the volunteers still had to report for duty, and the museum had to make sure they were healthy when they showed up for work.

Master Corporal Lana checks in a museum staff member.

Taking on a new assignment didn't faze Lana in the least, Jeremy Blowers, the museum's executive director, told this website during a phone interview.

A change of plan

Blowers' team programmed Lana to check volunteers' temperatures using a thermal sensor and ask them health related questions. Lana conducted the check-ins without a hitch.

Had any of the volunteers posed a risk based on their temperature reading or their answers to Lana's questions, these individuals would have been sent home. To date, no one has been.

And since Lana checks the volunteers in by recognizing their faces using a facial recognition camera, the museum has a record of who was in the building in the eventuality that a volunteer or a staff member becomes infected.

From the beginning, most volunteers welcomed Lana since she relieved them pf having to sign in and out of the museum manually.

"I was surprised at how people are intrigued by (Lana) and want to interact with the AI character," Blowers said. "Because it's animated, they (the volunteers) seem to be drawn with trying to interact with Lana." He was also surprised at the speed of the facial recognition.

Some of the older members were reluctant at first, but the character is very welcoming and members enjoyed interacting with her.

If Lana can't answer a question, she says she does not yet know the answer and asks them to speak to a staff member. "She'll give you a response even if she does not know the answer," Blowers said.

The team soon realized that Lana could perform similar functions for visitors once the museum reopened, which it did on Aug. 15 for limited hours and on weekends.

A second installation

One robot now greets employees at the staff entry while the other has been positioned to greet visitors at the front lobby. There is always a staff member nearby when the museum is open to the public. Each robot is wired to the museum's Internet service provider.

When greeting a guest, Lana explains the visitor is being screened for COVID-19. She also asks them to consent to being questioned about their health.

"If you want to visit our museum, you must do this," Blowers said.

The team has not yet decided how long they will store the visitors' information.

A great time saver

One of Lana's key benefits for the staff is her reliable time keeping of members and visitors. Blowers said. The solution has removed a lot of paperwork for the staff. Blowers estimated he and his operations manager have saved at least an hour and a half.

In addition, "It seems to be giving our members a greater sense of security in our COVID-19 measures," he said. "They know that we're taking COVID-10 seriously."

Blowers is currently working on expanding Lana's capabilities with CloudConstable, a local provider of virtual agent technology that developed Lana.

He envisions Lana being able to recognize the visitor's language and check them in speaking their native language. The museum, after all, attracts a global audience.

Lana's cost — each device will cost around $5,000 — has been supported by the charity that runs the museum.

No member of the organization, including 140 members, has taken ill form the pandemic, Blowers said.

He and his team now look forward to the day when the museum will no longer be restricted to 50 visitors at a given times. When the museum can resume its normal schedule, there is no doubt Lana will play a major role directing guests to a wide variety of activities.

For an update on how the coronavirus pandemic affects kiosks, click here.

Images courtesy of the Ontario Regiment Museum.