A Warm Cyber-Welcome: Using an Agent-Led Group Tour to Introduce Visitors to Kyoto

Like thriving physical cities, successful digital cities will provide many opportunities and approach points for building local social connections and context. This project focuses on bringing cultural outsiders into the Kyoto Digital City community, using a tactic that is well understood in the physical world of travel: the guided group tour. We are creating an interface agent to perform the tour guide role. With careful design of this agent’s narration strategies, we can accomplish two goals: providing preliminary cultural and historical context for foreigners who want to learn more about Kyoto, and providing a shared experience, so that they can form relationships that build upon their common interest in Kyoto.