If you’re thinking about flying from Shanghai to Beijing, you might want to consider taking China Eastern. The Chinese airline has partnered with Microsoft to test out a new “artificial intelligence” (AI) flight system aimed at making flying more convenient for passengers on its MU5117 flight between Shanghai and Beijing. The first flight to use the new system took flight on Tuesday.
The “AI” in question here is Microsoft China’s Xiaoice – basically, the Chinese version of Cortana. It’s a mobile assistant somewhat like Siri – not all that exciting in and of itself – but it has been tweaked in collaboration with China Eastern to offer a variety of flight-specific services. Before boarding, passengers can use it on their mobile devices to check out flight and boarding information. Once on board, they can use it in combination with the onboard wifi to do a variety of things including chat with other passengers, call for or chat with flight attendants, set reminders for themselves, make their food orders, and more.
There are reportedly still a few bugs in the system: Chinese tech site Sina Tech took the inaugural flight yesterday and reports that it suffers from slowdowns and user errors if too many people are on it at once. But it still seems like it could be a cool way to make the flying experience more convenient.
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(Source: Sina Tech)
Photo by Aero Icarus
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