Ask Otto

Imagineering and Disneyland unveiled a new service this week, Ask Otto! Otto, a voice interface, allows guests to call in and get information about attraction wait and FASTPASS times, operating hours, dining options and locations, and show times for parades, shows, and nighttime spectaculars. If there is a question Otto can’t answer, or if guests need assistance in making reservations or purchasing tickets, he is fully capable of transferring the caller to the appropriate cast member.

The real question I have is how long before this comes to Walt Disney World?

I understand that the Florida resort has double the amount of parks, a larger set of entertainment entities, and somewhere in the neighborhood of ten times the resorts and rooms. With that in mind, it is easy to see why Disneyland was chosen as the proving ground for Otto. However, once the kinks and bugs are worked out and additional amounts of data can be added into the bionic brain of Otto, I’m almost certain Walt Disney World will have its own Otto.

If we are eventually granted our own Ott, I only ask that he be named Vincent. For those unfamiliar with the 1979 film, The Black Hole Vincent or V.I.N.CENT was the small droid with all the answers whose name was an acronym for Vital Information Necessary CENTralized. Sounds like the perfect description for a Walt Disney World interface to answer all of guests vacation questions, doesn’t it?

I’ve been thinking over this, and I have been unable to find any real downside to Otto, only that after EPCOT Center’s WorldKey and SMRT-1 it is shocking that it has taken this long for an Otto type of system to be put into play. Until Walt Disney World is granted its own Otto counterpart, we’ll just have to plan trips to Disneyland, or maybe just call to chat with Otto and see how his day is going out in California.