On a sunny Monday morning in late September, a river of vacationers flowed slowly by the Piazza della Rotonda. The point of interest of the piazza is the Pantheon, the practically 2,000- year-old temple to all of the Roman gods, and is likely one of the metropolis’s hottest landmarks.
Fronted by imposing rows of Corinthian columns, it deserves the eye it attracts. Practically each customer slowed down for a photograph or selfie, vainly making an attempt to seize its excellent proportion in pixels.
Antonio Preiti, himself a citizen of Rome, was additionally utilizing his smartphone in entrance of the Pantheon. He opened a dialog with a easy query: Is there a quiet, historic place close by the place we will have lunch?
A digital tour information named Julia, commissioned by town of Rome and powered by Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service utilizing GPT-4o, responded that the Piazza Mattei, also referred to as the Turtle Sq., was simply quarter-hour away on foot. There we’d discover one other place typical of Rome, with layers that traverse hundreds of years. Preiti and two companions set off, following Julia’s instructions.
The AI digital assistant is the brainchild of Preiti and the federal government of Rome, which is making ready to greet as many as 35 million further guests in 2025 for the celebration of the Catholic Jubilee. The identify Julia was chosen, Preiti says, “as a result of it’s quick, pretty frequent throughout many languages and it has a deep connection to Rome and its historical past. Julia is a sometimes Roman identify: Julius Caesar’s daughter was named Giulia, Augustus’s daughter was named Giulia, and one of many oldest households in Rome had the Latin identify ‘gens Julia’.”
Working with Microsoft and NTT DATA, a world supplier of enterprise and know-how providers, and Intellera, a consulting firm within the Accenture Group, town hopes that Julia will create a quiet revolution in how guests expertise town. By equipping vacationers with a trusted information, town needs to counterpoint their experiences past the everyday vacationer circuit, all whereas easing congestion round the preferred websites.
