Chatbots
News and Events on Chatbots
16 posts
Customer Experience
Federal Student Aid’s New Virtual Assistant Offers Model for Improved Customer Service in Government
Aidan, Federal Student Aid’s new virtual assistant, gives customers instant responses to questions about financial aid, loan balances, repayment plans, where to find pages on StudentAid.gov, how to identify their loan servicers, and more, without having to contact a call center.
The Data Briefing: How to Build a Chatbot in a Weekend
As chatbots have become more popular, some online sites will let you create a chatbot with little or no programming.
The Data Briefing: How Blockchain’s Future Growth Will Affect Federal Agencies
Blockchains are an innovative technology which promises to radically change how society conducts business. It will take significant changes in organizational processes before agencies can begin to support blockchains.
The Data Briefing: The Arrival of Generation Z into the Federal Government. And Generation A?
In the last national election, the earliest born members of Generation Z voted for the first time. In 2019, the American workforce will see the influx of tens of millions of Gen Zers who, according to some researchers, will be a stark contrast to the Millennials that will make the largest part of the 2020
The Data Briefing: the Promise – and Perils – of Artificial Emotional Intelligence
People are quick to treat computer programs as being more aware than computer code could be. However, can computer programs – especially chatbots – have a significant effect on people? Especially people suffering from depression or anxiety? A recent academic study shows some promising results from using a chatbot as a complement to a human therapist.
The Data Briefing: How to Best Prepare Federal Government Datasets for Chatbots
Forbes magazine recently ran an article showcasing six handy mobile apps that were built using federal government open data. The apps range from the Alternative Fueling Station Locator to ZocDoc (a doctor locator). What I especially like about the Forbes article is that the author describes the federal government data sets behind each app. There
Buzzwords for 2017
Along with the New Year comes new buzzwords. Here are some that you are certain to hear about and see this year. Chatbot Short for ”chat robot,” a chatbot is a computer program that simulates human conversation, or chat, through artificial intelligence. They are commonly found on web sites and used to communicate with a person—you might have seen them
DigitalGov University in Review: 2016 Training Trends
DigitalGov University (DGU), the events platform for DigitalGov, provides programming to build and accelerate digital capacity by providing webinars and in-person events highlighting innovations, case studies, tools, and resources. Thanks to your participation, DGU hosted over 90 events with 6,648 attendees from over 100 agencies across federal, tribal, state, and local governments.
Are Chatbots the Next mHealth Frontier?
In April, Facebook made it possible for organizations to use chatbots to send and receive messages from users of Facebook Messenger. That’s a big deal. Facebook Messenger is now used by 900 million people every month. As the name implies, it’s a messaging platform that people use to send short messages to each other through
The Data Briefing: Help Predict the Future of Federal Government Data
In December, I plan to write two postings detailing a scenario analysis for the next ten years of the Federal government’s data technologies. Governments are on the cusp of amazing technological advances propelled by artificial intelligence, blockchain technologies, and the Internet of Things. Also, governments will face new challenges such as the recent global cyber
The Data Briefing: Using Artificial Intelligence to Augment the Work of Frontline Government Employees
You have probably read about the recent release of the White House’s report on using artificial intelligence (AI). As with previous technologies, AI holds much promise in the areas of education, commerce, criminal justice, the environment—almost all aspects of the American public’s life. AI also poses a danger if it is not properly managed and
Trends on Tuesday: The Digital Interface — Without a Face — Is Coming Fast
The seemingly sci-fi world envisioned in the movie Her is very close to becoming our reality. Several new developments merging hardware, artificial intelligence technology, chatbots and persistent audio assistants are now available, with software developer kits to expand the platforms. Amazon was first to market with their Echo device, and since have added the Echo
No Longer an Idea of the Future, Artificial Intelligence Is Here and You Are Probably Already Using It
It might surprise some of you to know that artificial intelligence (AI) is already in use and a routine part of our daily lives, but we leverage this technology when we use our smartphones or other devices to ask Apple’s Siri, Microsoft’s Cortana, Google Now, or Amazon’s Alexa a question to get the facts or data we
The Data Briefing: I, For One, Welcome Our New Chatbot Blockchain Digital Autonomous Organizations
It is at the intersections of fields where you find the most fascinating and innovative concepts. Recently, a conference on “Open Human Resources and the Cognitive Era” explored the use of chatbots and blockchain technologies in human resources. Human Resources (HR) is quietly undergoing a revolution as many HR practitioners are transforming HR by using
The Data Briefing: Better Crowdsourced Federal Government Projects Through Cognitive Computing
Cognitive computing has been receiving a good deal of attention lately as more companies have been building intelligent agents. Ever since IBM Watson’s 2011 appearance on Jeopardy, cognitive computing has spread into healthcare, investing and even veterinary medicine. However, it is only recently that cognitive computing has spread into government applications. As the name implies,
The Data Briefing: Chatbots and the Rise of Conversational Commerce and Citizen Experience
Ten months ago, I wrote about the rise of the post-app world in which mobile personal assistants would do the work of five to 10 apps combined. These mobile personal assistants, now known as chatbots, would work through conversational interfaces (voice and instant messaging, for example). The idea is to build more natural interfaces for people
