Install AI-scapes on Windows

What you need

• A PC running Windows 10 or Windows 11.
• Google Chrome — download here if you don't have it.
• A Google account you are willing to sign into.
• The extension .zip — download it here if you haven't yet.
• About 10–15 minutes.

1. Unzip the extension

1. Open File Explorer (Win+E) and go to wherever you saved ai-scapes-extension.zip (usually Downloads).
2. Right-click ai-scapes-extension.zip and choose Extract All…. Pick a stable destination such as C:\Users\<you>\Documents\ai-scapes-extension and click Extract.
3. Open the extracted folder and confirm it contains manifest.json directly. If manifest.json is one level deeper, use that inner folder for the next step.

2. Open Chrome's extensions page

1. Open Google Chrome.
2. In the address bar, type chrome://extensions and press Enter.
3. In the top-right corner, switch Developer mode ON.

3. Load the unpacked extension

1. Click Load unpacked (top-left of the page).
2. A folder picker opens. Navigate to the folder you extracted in step 1 (e.g. C:\Users\<you>\Documents\ai-scapes-extension) and click Select Folder.
3. The AI-scapes experiment card should appear. If a red error appears about manifest.json, you picked the outer folder by mistake — go one level deeper and re-select.

4. Allow the extension in Incognito

1. On the AI-scapes card, click Details.
2. Scroll down and switch Allow in Incognito ON.

5. Start the study

The consent page already opened in another tab the moment you loaded the extension in step 3. Switch to that tab and follow the flow:

1. On the consent page, tick the eligibility box (you confirm you are 18+, live in the US, are fluent in English, are using Google Chrome, and have an active personal Google account), then click I Agree.
2. On the setup page, sign into Google in this Chrome profile if you aren't already (the extension requests no permissions on your Google account — it only checks for an ordinary sign-in cookie). You already enabled Allow in Incognito in step 4. Then click Start Experiment.
3. On the experiment page, fill in the short questionnaire (three questions), then click Start study.

The extension will open 9 small Maps windows in parallel for the personalized wave, then a second wave of 9 incognito windows in parallel — 18 windows total across two waves. Each one auto-scrolls, collects the restaurant list, and closes itself. The whole run takes about 2–3 minutes. Leave Chrome in the foreground while it runs.

Troubleshooting

"Manifest file is missing or unreadable"

Chrome could not find manifest.json at the top of the folder you selected. Open the folder in File Explorer, look for manifest.json, and re-pick exactly that folder.

"This extension may have been corrupted"

Re-download the zip and extract it again — partial downloads can cause this. If it persists, switch off your antivirus's "scan extensions" feature temporarily.

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Uninstalling AI-scapes

You can remove the extension at any time. Uninstalling has two parts: unloading the extension from Chrome, and (optionally) deleting the folder you extracted earlier.

1. Remove the extension from Chrome

1. In Chrome's address bar, type chrome://extensions and press Enter.
2. Find the AI-scapes experiment card.
3. Click Remove, then confirm in the dialog that appears.

Chrome immediately stops loading the extension and clears its local storage (the installation identifier, any in-progress questionnaire answers, and unsubmitted study data).

2. Delete the extracted folder

1. Open File Explorer (Win+E) and navigate to where you extracted the extension — typically C:\Users\<you>\Documents\ai-scapes-extension.
2. Right-click the folder and choose Delete (or press Shift+Delete to skip the Recycle Bin).

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