Jibber Jabber

Inspiration

When I saw that this hackathon called for "building lasting relationships through conversation," I knew I had to enter. That goal resonated with me immensely, at a time when technology tends to connect us AND alienates us from each other. Many times, unfortunately, technology prevents us from having meaningful moments with the ones we love. And my mission with Jibber Jabber is to use technology to get people talking--to each other IRL.

To create Jibber Jabber, I drew from my experience as a former writer and as a mother and wife trying to constantly find new ways to connect with her son and husband. I'm sure others will find the chatbot helpful, whether it's to inspire conversations with family members or friends.

What it does

Jibber Jabber provides thoughtfully curated questions (and responses) daily so that users can have engaging and fun conversations with each other IRL. What's more, I put a lot of thought into the flow, from using Quick Replies to move the user through the experience to using GIFs to communicate visually to spending a significant amount of time on the script.

How I built it

For this version, I used ManyChat, a third-party tool for building FB Messenger Chatbots. It relies heavily on Quick Replies to get through the journey.

Challenges I ran into

I really wanted to build Jibber Jabber with sophisticated features, but had to scale down in the interest of meeting the hackathon deadline, but also knowing that starting with a simple version and adding features slowly in the future was the better route.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

I built a chatbot that will hopefully be useful to people, especially during a time we could all use some lighthearted conversations and ways to bond.

What I learned

Some of what I learned while I researched building chatbots won't be used until later versions of Jibber Jabber or other future chatbots. For example, I'd like to make Jibber Jabber more intuitive by adding NLP capabilities with Dialogflow or a similar technology.

I must say, however, I did learn about some best practices on building a chatbot, in addition to the pros and cons that come with technology. I look forward to continuing this journey.

What's next for Jibber Jabber

Incorporate NLP using Wit.ai or Dialogflow Building a Spanish-language version Adding an option that's kid-friendly

Built With

• manychat
• quickreplies