Museums around China have been shut down as the country continues to grapple with the coronavirus outbreak. But now at the instruction of the government, the local version of TikTok is teaming up with national museums to let people visit exhibitions on their phones.
ByteDance’s Douyin announced that nine museums will host virtual tours through live streaming and recorded videos. The tours will be done by professional tour guides and feature real-time Q&A sessions. Douyin said it held its first tour on Thursday evening, which was on the topic of oracle bone script at the Chinese National Museum.
In addition to live-streamed events, the new “At Home Cloud Museums” feature lets users “pick museums best fitted to their interests and embark on their own individual tours with these virtual museums.” It also features rare audio footage and VR projects.
According to the schedule, upcoming tours include “Revisit the Great Tang Dynasty” at the Liaoning Museum, “The Era of Yue King” at the Zhejiang Museum and “The Great Migration of African Wildlife” at the Shandong Museum.