POST OFFICE ROBOT

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 4, 6 January 1936, Page 9

POST OFFICE ROBOT

LYEOPiMATION DEVICE

SOON TO BE INSTALLED

The attendants at the information counter at the General Post Office will have fewer questions to answer within the next few days when a new robot information machine, the first of its kind in Australia or New Zealand, is installed. No longer will the harassed officials be worried with such questions as: "What is the postage on a letter to Peru?" or "Where do 1 take out a wireless licence?"

When the new machine is installed it is safe to say that the number of inquiries put through will, until the novelty of the new machine has worn off, be at least doubled. It cannot, of course, be denied that a large number of these inquiries will not be genuine. Who, for instance, could resist the temptation to press, say, button 39 and find out what risk one was running in postponing payment of an already overdue wireless fee until next pay day, and then to try button 25 to find out all about the new air-mail services. The idea of obtaining post office information instantly sounds almost too good to be true, and a perfect orgy of buttonpushing is anticipated.

The new machine, which is a British invention, was installed for the first time in England last August. Since then machines have been installed in France, Norway, Sweden, and South Africa. Charing Cross Post Office was the scene of the first English installation, and for days it was besieged by an army of information-seekers. The machine is nearly seven feet high, and at first glance is something like an ultra-modern weighing machine. Its black steel case is finished in chromium. It embodies a small internally-lighted stage, the back drop of which is an index, with the information classified under general headings and bearing- a number for each section.

The numbers, which run to fifty, correspond to those on a keyboard in the front of the machine, rather like an overgrown typewriter, and by pressing one of the buttons, a large card with the full details of the corresponding section in the index shoots into the limelight.