Brooklyn Museum, one of New York City’s largest and most innovative cultural institutions, has long sought ways to deepen the connection between visitors and its vast, diverse collection. With that mission in mind, the museum developed the Ask app, a mobile tool that allows visitors to message in real-time with art historians and educators during their visit.
But as the museum prepared to scale the experience and reach more users, especially Android users who had previously been excluded, technical and experiential challenges came to the forefront.
The challenge
While the Ask app had seen early success on iOS—with thoughtful design and messaging features modeled after iMessage—it faced a few limitations that hindered broader adoption and scalability:
- No Android version meant a significant portion of visitors couldn’t access the experience.
- 15% of iOS messages arrived without beacon location data, which meant staff couldn’t reliably identify which artwork a visitor was asking about—slowing down response times and reducing the relevance of their replies.
- Visitors needed a seamless, human-centric way to ask questions, get info, and share insights about artwork in real time with museum staff, ideally through a simple, familiar interface.
To deliver a truly inclusive, scalable experience, Brooklyn Museum needed a partner who could revisit the existing architecture, build for Android from the ground up, and refine the iOS experience without reinventing the wheel.
Brooklyn Museum approached HappyFunCorp to...
- Design and build an Android version of the Ask app that matched the functionality and experience of iOS.
- Reengineer the beacon detection logic to improve accuracy and reliability across both platforms, and help museum staff serve visitors more effectively.
- Refine the iOS app based on insights from Android development.
HappyFunCorp's approach
HappyFunCorp’s team took a thoughtful, technically rigorous approach rooted in user empathy and hands-on testing within the museum environment, breaking the project into three focus areas:
Cross-platform access and parity
HappyFunCorp developed full-featured Android and iOS versions of the Ask app, ensuring feature parity between both versions. Built to mirror the familiar messaging experience, the Android app allowed visitors to text with museum educators and include photos—just like its iOS counterpart—creating a seamless experience no matter what device museum guests use.
Smarter, testable beacon logic
To solve the beacon dropout issue that had affected around 15% of iOS messages, HappyFunCorp reengineered the beacon detection algorithm for more reliable performance. A major win was the development of in-app tools that allowed developers and museum staff to simulate and test beacon behavior in real time, dramatically improving troubleshooting and data accuracy.
These improvements were later ported back to the iOS app, leading to better location accuracy across both platforms—a key factor in enabling staff to respond quickly and contextually to visitor questions.
The team also implemented geolocation logic so the app only becomes fully available inside the museum, enabling a seamless before/during/after visit experience.
A visitor-first experience, preserved and extended
Throughout development, HappyFunCorp was careful to retain what made Ask special: its immediacy, ease of use, and the ability for visitors to chat about art with real, knowledgeable people—not a bot. The onboarding experience is quick and intuitive, requiring only a name and email, while the messaging UI preserved the convenience and familiarity of a text thread.
The results
The Ask app launched across both iOS and Android, dramatically expanding accessibility and improving the user experience for the Brooklyn Museum’s visitors. Within just three months of launch:
- 19,409 chats were initiated between visitors and museum staff
- 2,401 objects were specifically asked about via the app
Other highlights:
- Deeper visitor engagement: Users sent an average of 13 messages per conversation, reflecting high-quality dialogue between staff and guests.
- Smarter collection feedback: Chat transcripts helped curators better understand which artworks prompted questions or interest, offering new insight into visitor behavior.
- Inclusive access: Android users were now active participants in the Ask experience.
By combining elegant UX with technical reliability and thoughtful design, HappyFunCorp helped Brooklyn Museum take a meaningful step forward in creating an interactive, human-centered museum visit—and set the stage for future innovations in cultural engagement.
Need to bring a human touch to a technical challenge?
Let’s build something meaningful together.
Back to Work
