gtfo
December 5, 2016 1:27 PM   Subscribe

 
"You are the product" has rarely seemed more applicable.
posted by praemunire at 1:30 PM on December 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


I'm sure there will be a lot of discussion on how this is the herald of the end of blue-collar work but my hot take is over-analysis of why they chose the cupcake and a woman to demonstrate that you can put shit back on shelves. Why did she pause? (answer is obvious) Why did she ultimately decide to take the cupcake? Any why a cheesecake cupcake?
posted by GuyZero at 1:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [6 favorites]


If any well-meaning hacker wants to subvert this so that people on food stamps can get even more free food…
posted by Going To Maine at 1:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [29 favorites]


"You are the product" has rarely seemed more applicable.

But the shoppers actually do pay for the stuff. It's not a free-stuff store. It's the same amount of data that every grocery store in the US already collects.
posted by GuyZero at 1:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [40 favorites]


Seems pretty defraudable, curious to see how this plays out.
posted by kafziel at 1:32 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


If RFID chips become more common, I can totally see this coming. Walk through a gateway, you are checked out. Sign me up!
posted by Bee'sWing at 1:36 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


"Job creators"
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:36 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Back in 1999, IBM had a very 1999 take on this concept.

The extensive use of ML and CV instead of RFID in Amazon's implementation seems incredibly problematic. Can twins shop at the same store?
posted by schmod at 1:36 PM on December 5, 2016 [19 favorites]


Lovely how the phrase "weed out" is perfectly timed to the dude leaving with his burrito.
posted by chavenet at 1:41 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


Glad that the top comments on the Hacker News discussion on this story have been criticizing the social cost of automation for the sake of automation.

On second glance, it looks like it's now the third top comment thread. Oh well.
posted by Apocryphon at 1:42 PM on December 5, 2016


I mean, their threat model is presumably "don't be a whole lot worse than a normal grocery store." Someone with a ski mask (or without one for that matter) can go grab a whole bunch of stuff from a 7-11 and walk out without paying now and may well get away with it. The goal isn't to create a theft-free fortress. If someone was going to eschew the custom of "go the cashier and pay for your stuff," then they're still going to be able to do that here.
posted by zachlipton at 1:42 PM on December 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


Back in 1999, IBM had a very 1999 take on this concept .

"So we want it to feel like the "Been Caught Stealing" video and Run Lola Run had a baby and that baby was horrible." - some 1999 IBM exec apparently.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:43 PM on December 5, 2016 [18 favorites]


Isn't this model already in use in parts of Europe?
posted by ZeusHumms at 1:44 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


criticizing the social cost of automation for the sake of automation.

How do you figure? This at least theoretically has a pretty clear benefit.
posted by eugenen at 1:44 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


ZeusHumms: "Isn't this model already in use in parts of Europe?"

Here's a French variation

posted by chavenet at 1:47 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


What struck me is no one verified their charges until the lady had already left the store at the end. Assuming I ever shopped in a place like this, I'd make sure before I left the store that I'd been charged for what I'd bought and nothing else.
posted by oheso at 1:54 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]



The extensive use of ML and CV instead of RFID in Amazon's implementation seems incredibly problematic. Can twins shop at the same store?


I imagine that they're not doing any sort of identification based on visual cues. You're checking in with your phone when you enter -- from that point, all they have to do is follow you around.
posted by Hamusutaa at 1:54 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


It seems to me that every step we take towards hiding the existence of actual money in transactions (eftpos instead of cash, pay via phone or watch, and now ultimately things like this) makes it harder and harder to ignore bullshit salary inequalities.

I mean, what we have here is a thing where two people walk into a store and because one works on wall street they walk out with a large amount of healthy luxury food items and the other is, say, a teacher and so they can only walk out with a small amount of less healthy, more basic staples. The wall street dude picks up wine; the teacher isn't "allowed" to (because society doesn't value him/her enough).

The average woman who walks into a shop like that is only allowed to take, what is it? 79% as much as the average man.

It's always been this way, but I think it's more transparent when the money is no longer apparent as an intermediary.

One day when every purchase is made automatically by tracking us, we can do away with the pretence of wages at all and just have the algorithm identify directly that this person is white, male, had rich parents, and works in marketing and therefore he is entitled to that flash car and fancy house, but that woman over there is only a kindergarten teacher from a poor immigrant background so the algorithm only assigned her a crappy studio flat, and no, she can't have a car.

(If that makes you uncomfortable, so should the current situation.)
posted by lollusc at 1:59 PM on December 5, 2016 [84 favorites]


One of the tinfoil-hat, Skynet-lite scenarios I used to throw at my friends ~15 years ago was the idea of one day being automagically charged for the God-awful muzak/Xmas songs you were forced to endure in the local shopping mall. "Nice" to see that day is one step closer.
posted by comealongpole at 2:01 PM on December 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


What struck me is no one verified their charges until the lady had already left the store at the end. Assuming I ever shopped in a place like this, I'd make sure before I left the store that I'd been charged for what I'd bought and nothing else.

Presumably it will at least start with Amazon's usual level of customer service. IME, that has been, whatever the customer says goes. (They failed to give me back my money on a couple of returns. When I mentioned this, the customer service credited my card without any hesitation.)

My problem is that I really like buying produce. And this model does not seem conducive to weighed produce. But maybe they can eventually do it like Trader Joe's does it, with pre-packaged/weighed produce.
posted by ethidda at 2:01 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


One of the tinfoil-hat Skynet-lite scenarios I used to throw at my friends ~15 years ago was the idea of one day being charged for the God-awful muzak/Xmas songs you were forced to endure in the local shopping mall. "Nice" to see that day is one step closer.

All costs are already factored into the price of the goods sold. You're paying for the location, the lights, the heat, the freezers, the music, everything. What you describe has always been true.

Now, there isn't a separate line item on the receipt for muzak, but that doesn't mean you didn't pay for it.
posted by GuyZero at 2:02 PM on December 5, 2016 [52 favorites]


This at least theoretically has a pretty clear benefit.

The deep learning algorithms silently judge you for your selections without needing any human intervention
posted by XMLicious at 2:04 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


I'd just go with The cutting edge of job-cutting technology as a slogan for this. Or Wait less 35 seconds as you cruise from your third to fourth job because we made sure there's no value in labor anymore.

Isn't this model already in use in parts of Europe?
There's self checkouts , but most of the time, it seems more time is spent dealing with the machines that waiting in line would take, unless it's only a couple of items and on a busy day (where there's also a lot of people in that line trying to understand how the machine works and this note isn't that bent and accept my coins you stupid machine).

I'm expecting a lot of costumers being charged with items they didn't bought because it was placed back 10 mm to the left of the sensor, or with something someone else picked up next to them, and so on. Suddenly, that "no line" becomes "going back to argue with store manager".
posted by lmfsilva at 2:10 PM on December 5, 2016


Yay! Soon cashiers will be unemployed! /notactuallyyay
posted by The otter lady at 2:12 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Well, that'll teach shoppers to replace items on the correct shelf if they decide they don't want something. Set the cupcake down in the wine section, probably won't be a valid return.
posted by aimedwander at 2:13 PM on December 5, 2016 [9 favorites]


One of the small joys of my day is interacting with people in retail establishments. I truly loathe the trend towards reducing intra-human contact.
posted by grumpybear69 at 2:13 PM on December 5, 2016 [18 favorites]


Agreed on Amazon customer service, ethidda. And I still double-check before I check out on their site. I've caught mistakes a couple of times -- which were probably my own.
posted by oheso at 2:14 PM on December 5, 2016


Industry-wide shrinkage rates average 2.7% FYI

Amazon will probably let you dispute purchases. You'll just deny taking something and they'll refund you. You may be able to steal stuff. As long as those things are less than 2.7% of sales then Amazon will do better than most stores.
posted by GuyZero at 2:15 PM on December 5, 2016 [6 favorites]


This looks like a brick-and-mortar retail store that requires a customer to own and be carrying a smartphone? Have I got that right? I hate waiting on lines too, but wow, this strikes me as somehow offensively and unusually elitist. Boy, that will keep the riff-raff out, eh?

Do we really want to rely on our stupid phones for even more things? "I was going to pick up some dinner on the way home, but I dropped my phone in the toilet, so I can't get into the fancy new grocery store and I also can't use Apple Pay/Android Pay at the ordinary grocery store. I'd text my spouse to ask for help but..."
posted by Western Infidels at 2:16 PM on December 5, 2016 [10 favorites]


Do any of the people responsible for this effort know anybody who doesn't own a smartphone?
posted by zachlipton at 2:18 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Errors always occur. I bought some lemon pepper at the co-op once, and they rang it up as myrrh. I didn't even know they sold that - I guess it's kept over with the gold and frankincense.
posted by thelonius at 2:18 PM on December 5, 2016 [15 favorites]


Did anyone else see that comic in which the Amazon Echo says "Oh look, I can provide anything you want, hands free! I'm so convenient! Why don't you try me? What do you want?" and the person says, "A simple life and a swift death."

With that said, I agree that amazon's customer service is far better than I ever expected it would be back in the 90s.
posted by janey47 at 2:19 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


oh, here it is, I mean this one.
posted by janey47 at 2:20 PM on December 5, 2016 [9 favorites]


This looks like a brick-and-mortar retail store that requires a customer to own and be carrying a smartphone? Have I got that right? I hate waiting on lines too, but wow, this strikes me as somehow offensively and unusually elitist. Boy, that will keep the riff-raff out, eh?

The percentage of US adults with a smart phone was 68% in 2015, up from 35% in 2011. One expects it will only grow.

Do we really want to rely on our stupid phones for even more things?

I literally never go anywhere without my iPhone. My iPhone is my new wallet.

"I was going to pick up some dinner on the way home, but I dropped my phone in the toilet, so I can't get into the fancy new grocery store and I also can't use Apple Pay/Android Pay at the ordinary grocery store. I'd text my spouse to ask for help but..."

I forgot my wallet in my gym bag in my car the other day and paid with my watch. You say potato, I say po-tah-toe.

OTOH, if you want to talk about the negative impacts of eliminating yet another entire sector of employees, I'm game.
posted by entropicamericana at 2:20 PM on December 5, 2016 [10 favorites]


The smartphone thing is a bug, imo, a kind-of weird Americanism about the chip and pin cards (credit and debt). We can just tap our cards and go on charges up to $100 in most grocery stores now. No physical contact, swiping, pins or signatures needed. For higher values, the card needs to go in a reader and have a pin entered, so there would need to be exit terminals in most cases.

IDK why US banks don't do this frankly, but I think it's a large part of the reason Apple Pay can exist at all.
posted by bonehead at 2:21 PM on December 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


Do any of the people responsible for this effort know anybody who doesn't own a smartphone?

Nope. In Silicon Valley even small children have smartphones. I assume the same is true in parts of Seattle.

A lot of people can't shop at Whole Foods either but they don't seem especially upset about it.
posted by GuyZero at 2:21 PM on December 5, 2016


It's the same amount of data that every grocery store in the US already collects.

Only if you actively let them. Store loyalty cards are different, firstly because you don't have to use any true information (at least at the places I go) so it tracks buying patterns but does not tie them to you, personally, by name and address and phone number. it may be possible to associate the credit card and the loyalty card used in the same purchase, but you can still pay cash.

I accidentally picked up someone else's Safeway card and left my own behind one time and have been using it ever since, and I am sorry if that mystery person is being unfairly speculated about by store analysts due to her sudden spike in wine and cheese purchases since then. but better her than me. Amazon already knows most of my shameful buying habits, they don't need to know any more. the grocery store is one place they may not go with me, I forbid it.
posted by queenofbithynia at 2:22 PM on December 5, 2016


IDK why US banks don't do this frankly

Because it would cost them money and they DGAF about making your life easier. Re: this Planet Money episode.
posted by GuyZero at 2:23 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


*Takes an orange from a stack*

NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30

"Oh sh-!"

NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30
NAVEL ORANGE...$0.30

======================

GALLON WHOLE MILK....$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK...-$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK....$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK....$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK....$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK...-$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK...-$3.00
GALLON WHOLE MILK...-$3.00

"Yes! This one's best by date is over two weeks!"

GALLON WHOLE MILK....$3.00
posted by FJT at 2:23 PM on December 5, 2016 [42 favorites]


Yeah, not to derail but the "poor people don't have smartphones" is just a hop, skip, and jump from the Obamaphone controversy. There's a reason why Medicare and Medicaid sites are becoming increasingly mobile focused. Poor people don't have computers but they have phone, mostly because they damn near have to do so.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:24 PM on December 5, 2016 [19 favorites]


Also, if it's going to truly be an Amazon store, you'll run into the store, pick up a gallon of milk, and then the entire way home, your phone will ask you if you want to buy more milk since you seem interested in milk, and how about cereal or cookies and man, am I squicked out by this whole thing such that I can barely enjoy making dumb jokes about it.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:26 PM on December 5, 2016 [57 favorites]


Yay! Soon cashiers will be unemployed! /notactuallyyay

Self-checkout has pretty much been killing cashiers off anyway, while sneakily forcing customers to do the same job.
posted by Going To Maine at 2:27 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


USERS WHO BOUGHT MILK ALSO BOUGHT:

COOKIES

CEREAL

KY PERSONAL LUBRICANT

VEVOR ELECTRIC HOIST LIFT 440LBS 200KG 110V
posted by GuyZero at 2:28 PM on December 5, 2016 [84 favorites]


Poor people don't have computers but they have phone, mostly because they damn near have to do so.

It's Luddites like me who don't have a smartphone.

I'll just have to go back to planting a giant vegetable garden like my parents had.
posted by clawsoon at 2:29 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Now, there isn't a separate line item on the receipt for muzak, but that doesn't mean you didn't pay for it.

Definitely agree, yet whither window-shopping?
posted by comealongpole at 2:30 PM on December 5, 2016


This looks like a brick-and-mortar retail store that requires a customer to own and be carrying a smartphone? Have I got that right? I hate waiting on lines too, but wow, this strikes me as somehow offensively and unusually elitist. Boy, that will keep the riff-raff out, eh?

Anecdata: All of the smartphone eschewers that I know are relatively well off and/or old enough that it's unlikely that they will live to see a time when even 25% of stores require this technology (I'm thinking 15 years until that level of penetration, especially out here in the Middle West). All of the people I know who might be considered by some to be in a "riff-raff" type of socioeconomic status have smartphones.

Actual data: Walmart.com currently lists 5 prepaid smartphones that cost under $20. I clicked on one to make sure there weren't any weird installment plan tricks and it looks good. If the Amazon Go stores have WiFi (and you know they will), you don't even need a plan to go with it.

I mean, there's lots to be said about the dangers of a cash-less economy, and the creepiness of the data-mining that this kind of store allows/implies. And I betcha there will be some elitism to be found in the types of things that these stores carry (lots of premade sandwiches, fancy juices, and of course, cheesecake cupcakes), but I don't see a smartphone requirement being the problem in-and-of-itself.
posted by sparklemotion at 2:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


And I betcha there will be some elitism to be found in the types of things that these stores carry (lots of premade sandwiches, fancy juices, and of course, cheesecake cupcakes)

From a sample of one visit to London, this is actually 60% of UK street-level retail.
posted by GuyZero at 2:33 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


It's the same amount of data that every grocery store in the US already collects.

Nah, even my Whole Foods is not tracking my every step in the store and linking it to my purchasing decisions. That's what Amazon is really after here.
posted by praemunire at 2:38 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Seems to lend itself nicely to even marginally organized looting.
posted by ryanshepard at 2:41 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


Like ... what happens if my friend goes in and picks up, like, a sandwich, and then I go in and hand my phone to my friend before they leave? Or slip my phone into an anti-static bag at some point?
posted by kafziel at 2:42 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Some stores already do track customers based on their phone's wifi. Nordstrom used to, and I think Target.
posted by amarynth at 2:42 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


This could enable a cool new kind of shoplifting, where someone enters the store and then tries to convince the computer vision algorithms that you picked up the item instead of them.

... sounds like too much effort and questionably successful to be worthwhile, but hey.
posted by tiaz at 2:44 PM on December 5, 2016


This is the logical continuation of a process that started with the first store that allowed shoppers to browse instead of having to ask the person behind the counter for everything you want. So much trust of the consumer involved here! ...or at least trust in the systems which track down turnstile jumpers. It's a system which would collapse completely if enough people decided to jump the turnstiles, but for some reason that doesn't happen. (Yet.)

It's a little bit crazy, and I'm curious about what's required for a society to evolve so far in this direction. I'm reminded of the Russian soldiers in Solzhenitsyn's "August, 1914" who laughed at the tiny little useless locks that they found protecting stuff in the German towns they passed through.
posted by clawsoon at 2:45 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Can anyone here visit and tell us what it was like? I'm so curious to know if its as seamless as it is in the video.
posted by weewooweewoo at 2:49 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Yay! Soon cashiers will be unemployed! /notactuallyyay
posted by The otter lady at 4:12 PM on December 5 [+] [!]


There are still a lot of jobs that are hard to automate. Someone has to stock the goods, mop the floors, wrangle the carts, work the deli, meat counter, coffee bar.
posted by Bee'sWing at 2:49 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Nah, even my Whole Foods is not tracking my every step in the store and linking it to my purchasing decisions. That's what Amazon is really after here.

I don't know what WF specifically does, but this is absolutely possible today. They track your phone via wifi, can track its location fairly accurately via triangulation and yes, they correlate this with video data from store cameras.

Can anyone here visit and tell us what it was like? I'm so curious to know if its as seamless as it is in the video.

I think this is just a pre-announcement - it doesn't open until the new year.
posted by GuyZero at 2:51 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


The Solzhenitsyn quote I was thinking of:

"The padlocks that the Germans put on their store-rooms were not strong and, absurd though it was, they seemed to believe that any lock on a door, however small, was enough to prevent someone from trying to break it open."
posted by clawsoon at 2:51 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Nah, even my Whole Foods is not tracking my every step in the store and linking it to my purchasing decisions.

Are you sure about that? Here's the text of an advertisement for that kind of system from 2012.
posted by XMLicious at 2:51 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I'm just waiting for the first black person accused of "shoplifting" in this store because CV doesn't handle black skin well.
posted by ymgve at 2:52 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


Investment tip: go long big jackets with lots of pockets
posted by chavenet at 2:52 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


There are still a lot of jobs that are hard to automate. Someone has to stock the goods, mop the floors, wrangle the carts, work the deli, meat counter, coffee bar.

Most of those are much easier if you're not constrained by the current configuration of the store. Part of the future will involve spaces both public and private being reworked and redesigned to accommodate robots.
posted by Pope Guilty at 2:54 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


In a movie I watched about hapless terrorists (the name of which I don't remember), one of the protagonists was convinced that security cameras could be defeated by quickly moving your face back and forth.

Anybody want to give it a try?
posted by clawsoon at 2:55 PM on December 5, 2016


Part of the future will involve spaces both public and private being reworked and redesigned to accommodate robots.

The back of the store has a machine where you shove live pigs in one end and get prosciutto baguette sandwiches out the other end.
posted by GuyZero at 2:55 PM on December 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


In a movie I watched about hapless terrorists (the name of which I don't remember), one of the protagonists was convinced that security cameras could be defeated by quickly moving your face back and forth.

Close, but nope. Dazzle baby, dazzle.
posted by GuyZero at 2:56 PM on December 5, 2016 [6 favorites]


I acquired a smartphone quite late (2014) for financial reasons. There's a demographic at a certain intersection of income and lifestyle (that honestly might just be grad students not receiving support from parents) who have home internet access, but for whom internet + smartphone is not a worthwhile use of their funds. Friends with less money than me had PAYG smartphones (and would be forever switching numbers when they couldn't afford to top it up) and laptops, but no home internet access, and would take their laptop to the library and use the wifi there if they needed non-mobile internet browsing.
posted by hoyland at 2:56 PM on December 5, 2016


The back of the store has a machine where you shove live pigs in one end and get prosciutto baguette sandwiches out the other end.

It's the obvious next step in the evolution of the baguette vending machine.
posted by peeedro at 2:58 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


The back of the store has a machine where you shove live pigs in one end and get prosciutto baguette sandwiches out the other end.

Many of the steps involved are going to be hard to do, but once you've got sliceable meat you're already in the territory where machines can plausibly take over in the near future. Automation doesn't have to be at every step of the process or completely eliminate human interaction to be devastating to employment and/or transformative of the experience, after all.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:00 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


GuyZero, that was hilarious.
posted by persona au gratin at 3:02 PM on December 5, 2016


Also, if it's going to truly be an Amazon store, you'll run into the store, pick up a gallon of milk, and then the entire way home, your phone will ask you if you want to buy more milk since you seem interested in milk, and how about cereal or cookies and man, am I squicked out by this whole thing such that I can barely enjoy making dumb jokes about it.

One of my thoughts about self-driving cars is that when they're not carrying a fare-paying passenger they could follow pedestrians around and shout advertisements at them, offering a ride to the advertising retail outlet for a free or discounted fare. If it's a restaurant, the cars could also have the same odor-boxes that waft things like fake scent of steak over roadways, customized to accompany the advertisement.
posted by XMLicious at 3:05 PM on December 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


I agree with its being unfortunate that we're moving away from interactions with people in retail spaces. Some days that's the only human contact I get. And I always appreciate being able to chit chat with a real person at the register (ok, yes I'm from the Midwest).
posted by persona au gratin at 3:05 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Soon they will do amazon grocery corner stores!
posted by SacHealthNut at 3:08 PM on December 5, 2016


For me, the fact that I can get through so much more of my day without having to interact with people (cashiers, etc) has improved my life dramatically over 20-30 years ago. Interacting with strangers is exhausting and anxiety-producing.

(Thankfully I'm planning to move to a country where luckily that kind of "friendly banter" with salespeople/strangers/etc is much less common anyway, but in the meantime I appreciate being able to shop for groceries without having to have an extended forced conversation)
posted by thefoxgod at 3:10 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Re: Poverty and cell-phones. For those who think poor people don't own smartphones in large numbers, you might want to check out M-Pesa.

(Of course now there's the problem that Vodafone is now the, possibly-unknowing-and-certainly-involuntary, de facto central bank of Kenya.)
posted by PMdixon at 3:12 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Not only is automation an issue, but this is the vector through which tyranny occurs. One's ability to control one's outward identity is best solved through strengthening of the bill of rights, not through acceptance of police state tools masked as tools of convienence.
posted by Strange_Robinson at 3:13 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Eventually it will just be all "you know you buy that cupcake every day, subscribe and save and we'll have one waiting for you when you walk in." And they can track your phone and a cupcake robot will just hand you your cupcake.
posted by zachlipton at 3:14 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


Odd that nobody's mentioned this, but this is already how the Apple Store works – you don't actually have to talk to anybody, you can just pick up something, scan it with your phone, and walk out. Obviously they don't have tablets or phones or computers lying around, so there is a price point at which they apparently won't trust you to do this, but it works for anything on the rack or the shelf. This is how I basically always buy cables or plugs; it's stupid to have to flag somebody down to ring you up for something like that, although I always feel a little weird and look over my shoulder a bit when I'm walking out with a thing that I didn't actually talk to anyone about.
posted by koeselitz at 3:25 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


It's a system which would collapse completely if enough people decided to jump the turnstiles, but for some reason that doesn't happen. (Yet.)

A: Sir, the Echoplex reports that store #66D3F2 is exhibiting high indicators for identification avoidance.
B: Someone in Williamsburg must have found that damned Instructable again. Initiate an order for an upgraded security module at that store, make sure it gets in before the one-day window closes.
A: Yes sir.*

The next day, before dawn: A Prime Deliverdrone drops off a package containing the components to install a 5 foot gate. The package is addressed to Jim Sozeb, the TaskRabbiter who was first to respond to the Request for Labor generated as part of the Upgrade Security Module order. Customers have been informed that the store will temporarily close, and the lights are dimmed 15 minutes before package arrival. Jim arrives just as the last customer is leaving. Because Jim has studied the security upgrade installation techniques previously on this Oculus he performs the removal of the old gate and installation of the new gate 15% faster than the median. Jim's punctuality and efficient earn him high ratings for the task. The Echoplex increases its metric for Jim's desirability for similar tasks. He'll be more likely to get the call first, next time. Store #66D3F2 reopens in less than 20 minutes.

Reopened, the glass design of the outer walls and gates means that little looks changed for the customers. Those who notice the slight hesitation before the larger glass gate slides open for them might wonder at the delay, but likely write it off to another high-frequency trading spike. Store #66D3F2 is, however, now better protected from those who would enter without authorization.

Jack Nosille has previously appreciated the presense of Store #66D3F2. When he is more flush, he's happy to pay but on weeks like this, Jack is leaving his phone at home -- at least he knows he can still get a meal, he thinks. Jack doesn't notice the extra gate until he's almost through it. Stymied, he turns and walks away. The Echoplex, having detected the non-identified person making an attempted entry sends Jack's picture and weight, and any RFID data it could read on his person from outside of the store to the local authorities. They won't act on this one incident, of course, the amount of data is overwhelming. But it's another key in a hash, another row in a generated table.

When Jack faces arrest for the assault of the PrimeRestockDrone a few weeks later, his lawyer lets him know that his attempt at non-identified entry can be used against him. But, the lawyer pulls out his phone and shows Jack the notification that triggered on his way into the jail. It's a Gold Box Deal! Amazon is willing to request that the charge be dropped, in exchange for a direct RFID installation. Jack acquiesces, of course -- people get these implants all the time, it is more convenient than carrying a phone after all. I mean, yeah his implant is installed in the parietal lobe, making removal impossible without risking brain damage. But he'll always be welcome at store #66D3F2, even though the Echoplex now chooses to directly garnish his wages to pay for each meal.

*Neither A nor B is aware or programmed to care whether their counterpart is a human or more software. It doesn't matter.
posted by sparklemotion at 3:26 PM on December 5, 2016 [43 favorites]


One's ability to control one's outward identity is best solved through strengthening of the bill of rights, not through acceptance of police state tools masked as tools of convienence.

But this doesn't seem to do anything to one's outward identity as far as I can tell? What this actually seems to do (if universalized) is make all but the most trivial claims on resources (ie, property and property-like things) mediated through a technology that in its present form is controlled through a central locus. (I'm reasonably sure there are schemes that would function the same from the end-user's standpoint without a single node being able to control access. It's a contingency of politics and economics that the one that's being deployed is as it is.)

It's not obvious to me that this significantly increases the ability of a state-like actor to cut someone off over and above the arrangement in the status quo. (It's pretty easy to separate someone from access to their resources in the status quo, in most cases.)
posted by PMdixon at 3:29 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


The smartphone thing is a bug, imo, a kind-of weird Americanism about the chip and pin cards (credit and debt). We can just tap our cards and go on charges up to $100 in most grocery stores now. No physical contact, swiping, pins or signatures needed. For higher values, the card needs to go in a reader and have a pin entered, so there would need to be exit terminals in most cases.

This is rare in the US, but it's not unheard of. I had a Mastercard from Citi that allowed this. Having used it, as well as Apple Pay, I think Apple Pay is superior in almost every way and I'd choose it every time if I had both on me (as it is, I no longer carry that Mastercard). Not only does it not have the $100 limit, but it has more authentication, uses a unique account number with each merchant, allows me to select from any of my cards with the same account, and provides me an instant electronic record of the charge processed. This is why Apple Pay is "can exist" — it is actually better, at least for the subset of people who have compatible devices.
posted by primethyme at 3:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


*fresh peanut butter drips out of my coat*
officer no one is more surprised than I to hear that this Whole Foods is not in fact an Amazon Go
--@petridishes
posted by zachlipton at 3:37 PM on December 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


It's not obvious to me that this significantly increases the ability of a state-like actor to cut someone off over and above the arrangement in the status quo. (It's pretty easy to separate someone from access to their resources in the status quo, in most cases.)

It is status quo, or rather one more knife cut in the wrong direction. If the Muslim registry in the US is a real concern, then stuff like this must be pushed back against, and overturned. And if I have my way, then AI technologists will have to rework a whole lot.

Worse than Trump is coming if folks ignore these issues.
posted by Strange_Robinson at 3:42 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Odd that nobody's mentioned this, but this is already how the Apple Store works – you don't actually have to talk to anybody, you can just pick up something, scan it with your phone, and walk out.

Does it depend on what location? You could not do this at any Apple store in Manhattan that I am aware of. The employees there jump on you as soon as you touch anything.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:43 PM on December 5, 2016


Also, do you have to bag your own groceries at this store? And provide your own bag? I'm okay with bringing my own bag, but many people I know would need help bagging.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:44 PM on December 5, 2016


.Can anyone here visit and tell us what it was like?

It's only open to Amazon employees until early 2017.
posted by the agents of KAOS at 3:57 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Ars Technica tried to sneak in. They were not successful, though they have pictures.
posted by zachlipton at 4:01 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


The self-checkout stations already allow for easy cheating if you want to steal (tell it you bought some cheap vegetable, instead of the expensive one you actually got, etc). Not to mention that outright shoplifting is not hard at grocery stores if you want. I'm sure its not hard to steal here, but its not hard to steal in general, doesn't seem any easier really.
posted by thefoxgod at 4:15 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Also, if it's going to truly be an Amazon store, you'll run into the store, pick up a gallon of milk, and then the entire way home, your phone will ask you if you want to buy more milk since you seem interested in milk, and how about cereal or cookies and

This is how I teach my Girl Scouts to sell cookies when we have booth sales at grocery stores.

"Look for milk," I tell them. "If they have milk, tell them they need cookies to go with it."

Works every time.
posted by phunniemee at 4:21 PM on December 5, 2016 [11 favorites]


In a movie I watched about hapless terrorists (the name of which I don't remember), one of the protagonists was convinced that security cameras could be defeated by quickly moving your face back and forth.

Jacob's Ladder?
posted by Existential Dread at 4:24 PM on December 5, 2016


So what does everything think the actual tech is here-- from what I'm guessing the initial 'sign-in' through the gate just locks your physical identity to your account, so the store isn't actually tracking your phone around, rather the 'gate' and cameras in the ceiling takes a few dozen pictures of you and uses that with computer vision embedded around the store keep a lock on you as you pass around the store.

The shelf part seems easier (though hella-computationally expensive)-- I'm guessing they have sensors/cameras embedded in the tops of the shelves, monitoring movement of product past it based on computer vision of the packaging, rather then barcodes/rfid. There's similar reliable tech out at the moment for automated scanning of things left on the bottom of shopping trolleys in some stores, you feed the system black and white imagery of the six sides of the item and then the system can identify it as it goes through. Amazon seems to have taken that to the next level if that's what they're doing, quite incredible really.

If that's true, then the entire system is tracking everything on a individual visual level, rather then 'beans live in this slot' because in a way, that's easier when you factor in customer chaos-- e.g. if a customer grabbed one blueberry muffin, one chocolate chip one and placed the blueberry one back in the choc chip slot, that's just 'meh' if the system is handling things on a totally visual level. Alert a clerk to move it back, but if another customer grabs it in the mean-time, no problem.
posted by Static Vagabond at 4:25 PM on December 5, 2016


IDK why US banks don't do this frankly, but I think it's a large part of the reason Apple Pay can exist at all.

They did, starting about 12 years ago. Back then the PIN/signature-free limit was only $20, though. There weren't a lot of stores with RFID readers, but they did exist. More and more places got them until around 2011/12, at which time replacements either lacked RFID or just didn't work. Lots of stores disabled their RFID readers when Apple Pay launched, I assume because they didn't have the software to support tokenization. (I used Google Wallet mostly everywhere until Apple Pay launched and fucked it up for me) Three or four years ago the card issuers seemed to give up and stop issuing cards with RFID.

Until my last replacement cycle 90% of my cards had RFID, but they were all replaced with non-rfid cards last time around. Maybe they were getting tired of people like me copying them to their RFID-enabled phones, IDK. (It was a pretty simple fraud vector, although nobody but me ever skimmed one of mine)

All that said, even places that supported RFID didn't train their employees on it, so they were always rather surprised by it, whether I used my phone or a card directly.
posted by wierdo at 4:28 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


In a movie I watched about hapless terrorists (the name of which I don't remember), one of the protagonists was convinced that security cameras could be defeated by quickly moving your face back and forth.

Four Lions
posted by ymgve at 4:38 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Odd that nobody's mentioned this, but this is already how the Apple Store works – you don't actually have to talk to anybody, you can just pick up something, scan it with your phone, and walk out.

That's like the thing chavenet linked to—carrying a hand-held scanner around the store, basically a mobile version of self-checkout.

This is a fundamentally different phenomenon, where the store itself is essentially intelligent and knows what you're doing while you're inside, which to me seems like a beachhead into a radically different relationship between consumer and vendor with far greater potential for further changes than just making the checkout scanners portable. Especially when combined with all the other forms of surveillance that have become ubiquitous.
posted by XMLicious at 4:42 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


...even places that supported RFID didn't train their employees on it, so they were always rather surprised by it...

My local Home Depot had a RFID reading card scanner at a register that was at table height. I scanned the UPC on the end of the thing I was buying and then just shook my rear at the card reader and it picked up the chip in the card in my wallet. The cashier hit one button and handed me the receipt, it kinda freaked them out.

This was always the promise of RFID chips for me. Go to the store and get out your bags, bag your groceries as you go, they get scanned as you go out. At the time I assumed that you'd pay with an RFID chip in your credit card but now smart phones have been invented.

Objections based on technology putting people out of work aren't going to go anywhere. It'll happen to everyone eventually, you can only maybe slow it down.
posted by VTX at 4:51 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Maybe you're super creative or something, but being able to walk out of a grocery store with bags full of groceries without anyone ever going "Hey, stop that guy" seems like it would make shoplifting easier.

This is pretty much how shoplifting happens already.

Amazon (and stores with self checkout) is/are just making the assumption that the amount of theft employees can stop is not worth the cost of the employees. Not to mention liability and brand reputation damage that can result from a couple of cases of wrongful accusation.
posted by sparklemotion at 4:56 PM on December 5, 2016


Not to mention liability and brand reputation damage that can result from a couple of cases of wrongful accusation.

Yeah, I have a friend who is a loss prevention person at a major chain and their policy is they are not allowed to pursue at all once someone leaves the store, because of some combination of those factors (he had previously worked at one where they could actually chase down a thief, so it varies by store of course, but there are already plenty of places where all you need to do is set foot outside the store).

Shoplifting appears to be stopped primarily by most people not being thieves, not by actual security features.
posted by thefoxgod at 4:59 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


"I don't feel like going down to the Amazon to pick up some eggs."

Now's the time to break ground on your personal Amazon shopper startup.
posted by theraflu at 5:14 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


This is pretty much how shoplifting happens already.

You might come to that link for the folks walking out of the store with a TV without a care in the world, but you're staying for the duckling story (top comment).
posted by zachlipton at 5:19 PM on December 5, 2016


In other news Donald Trump has announced a new 35% "giving jobs to robots" tax in an effort to Make America Great Again.

Robots instantly turn into confused Republicans and roll around the factory mumbling about "taxes bad" "jobs good"
posted by bitdamaged at 5:19 PM on December 5, 2016


“I don’t feel like going down to the Amazon to pick up some eggs.”

Now’s the time to break ground on your personal Amazon shopper startup.

And suddenly it’s clear what all of the unemployed cashiers will be doing instead.
posted by Going To Maine at 5:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I drove by this place on my way home from work today (not on purpose; my commute just happens to go through Amazon HQ and past this specific building, in addition to what we in Seattle like to call Jeff Bezos' Balls). It's very slick looking and there was a long queue of people outside trying to peek in. Given that the surrounding area is full of Amazon employees who are looking for a quick bite to eat, I think it's an interesting concept to test even just as a thought experiment. Don't know how I feel about this model in the long run, though.
posted by joan_holloway at 6:10 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Re: Poverty and cell-phones. For those who think poor people don't own smartphones in large numbers, you might want to check out M-Pesa.

M-Pesa is powered by SMS, USSD and STK. As such, it works just fine on the dumbest nokia candy bar phone you can find, which is part of why it works well in Africa. And even then, they chose to launch in Kenya, a comparatively well developed, stable nation with strong institutions. Without researching it too deeply, I have to imagine complacency of banks and banking regulators in Kenya are another part of M-Pesa's success.

Obviously we don't know the exact feature set required to participate yet, but it wouldn't be impossible to set up bluetooth on cheap android music players. That said, Amazon sells multiple phones at the 20 dollar price point. The greater hurdle may be whatever Prime membership is needed to actually shop there.
posted by pwnguin at 7:07 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I don't want to make another tired Orwell joke, but if I need to have my phone do a handshake with the grocery store, that's probably the line in the sand where I will start actually eating out of dumpsters.
posted by 256 at 7:17 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I don't know what WF specifically does, but this is absolutely possible today. They track your phone via wifi, can track its location fairly accurately via triangulation and yes, they correlate this with video data from store cameras.

My phone stays off when I am shopping. Won't stop the feds from scrutinizing my vegetable choices but limits what WF can do.
posted by praemunire at 7:35 PM on December 5, 2016


I thought most retail theft was perpetrated by employees (not sure about grocery stores). Perhaps what Amazon loses to "customers" it makes up by not having employees steal the same amount.
posted by AFABulous at 7:51 PM on December 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


I hate the future.
posted by Beholder at 8:05 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I hate the future.

Me, too - increasingly, it looks like the capitalist endgame is robot machine guns defending automated stores full of rotting food from hordes of starving people.
posted by ryanshepard at 8:09 PM on December 5, 2016 [21 favorites]


There's similar reliable tech out at the moment for automated scanning of things left on the bottom of shopping trolleys in some stores, you feed the system black and white imagery of the six sides of the item and then the system can identify it as it goes through. Amazon seems to have taken that to the next level if that's what they're doing, quite incredible really.


As of about two months ago (e.g., in time for 4Q and holiday shopping), the app Amazon offers people who sell stuff on their platform can now recognize lots of products from any angle. It works really well. Ergo, they definitely have the tech and they're prepared to sell a lot more stuff than groceries using the system.
posted by carmicha at 8:12 PM on December 5, 2016


Not long ago there was a thread where everyone was moaning about standing in line at the grocery. Well....
posted by Joe Chip at 8:31 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Not long ago there was a thread where everyone was moaning about standing in line at the grocery. Well....

So it DOES do portobello mushrooms then
posted by The otter lady at 8:43 PM on December 5, 2016 [4 favorites]


Given that many small markets provide livelihoods for immigrants, I fear the unequal impact of this.

But, as a Seattlite, I will check it out.
posted by k8t at 9:06 PM on December 5, 2016


This seems a little overkill - why a smartphone? Why an app? Why track customer all over the store? (Yes, I know it's because data mining) A barcode scanning shopping cart would be better at tracking the items. It can also weigh the items. It wouldn't even require a smartphone.

Heck, if this is about upselling the customer, we can make it a TALKING shopping cart that saves the route it travels throughout the store. really I just really don't like things that creep on my phone.
posted by Sallysings at 9:10 PM on December 5, 2016


I don’t want to make another tired Orwell joke, but if I need to have my phone do a handshake with the grocery store, that's probably the line in the sand where I will start actually eating out of dumpsters.

Why? I’m kind of curious. Why is this the straw that breaks the camel’s back? (What if, alternately, you could pick up some sort of temporary sensor at the store door and then stick your credit card into it at the exit?)
posted by Going To Maine at 9:20 PM on December 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Isn't the main point that Amazon can now charge different people different prices for the same goods? Like the company does on its website, and like it may or may not be doing in its brick and motor stores (the company currently does charge non-Prime members more at its physical locations)?

In the Amazon bookstores, prices aren't listed on the books. Instead, customers have to scan the item with their smartphone to get a person-specific price. I would imagine the end-game at the Amazon grocery store is similar.
posted by toofuture at 9:25 PM on December 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Isn’t the main point that Amazon can now charge different people different prices for the same goods? Like the company does on its website, and like it may or may not be doing in its brick and motor stores (the company currently does charge non-Prime members more at its physical locations)?

Your grocery store also charges you different prices for different goods - that’s why they print out custom coupons when you check out.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:36 PM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


Well, that'll teach shoppers to replace items on the correct shelf if they decide they don't want something. Set the cupcake down in the wine section, probably won't be a valid return.

Purchasing things has never been easier, just touch and buy!
posted by rhizome at 9:54 PM on December 5, 2016


I do wonder how they're going to handle the credit card fraud risks here (perhaps ignore them and hope people don't write comments like these I guess). They can always lock down your Amazon account until you pay up, but what do you do if someone sets up a new throwaway account backed by a prepaid card with no funds? I suppose if they want to get really fancy, they can run authorizations as you shop, then direct an employee to deal with you if the transactions fail. And presumably, they can use facial recognition to direct employees to ban you from the store if you pull this trick too many times.
posted by zachlipton at 10:15 PM on December 5, 2016


Nothing to worry about. All those lost cashiering jobs will quickly be replaced with jobs pre-packaging and affixing RFID tags to weighed items like produce. To the future!
posted by Graygorey at 11:04 PM on December 5, 2016


Aren't all of the employees who would have been grocery clerks now the people who clog up the aisles restocking continuously throughout the day and leaving pallets all over the place? This has the side bonus of ensuring that the shelves never run out of any of the 15 flavors of Triscuit the distributors are pushing.
posted by rhizome at 11:26 PM on December 5, 2016


Four Lions. The movie is Chris Morris' Four Lions.
posted by davemee at 2:04 AM on December 6, 2016


23skidoo: "Could I get a whole bunch of (immoral) groceries with this if I stole/borrowed someone's phone?"

You have to go to the Immoral Kiosk for that.
posted by chavenet at 2:37 AM on December 6, 2016 [4 favorites]


> (What if, alternately, you could pick up some sort of temporary sensor at the store door and then stick your credit card into it at the exit?)

You can already do this in many supermarkets here in the UK. So we're pretty close to this already, it doesn't seem a huge leap to me. Not that I don't have plenty of concerns, many of which have which have been covered here already. Coupled with the huge popularity of automatic checkouts, delivery, and click & collect services, cashier jobs are absolutely on the downslide here.

Anecdata...I've definitely noticed changes in service. Predictably, these changes are different depending on the context. Two supermarkets I have used for many years:

In the local Hackney Tesco, (now all automatic checkouts bar one) they just got rid of a lot of the customer facing staff who at least had some basic service training, and you increasingly feel as if you are an obstacle in the way of the shelf-stackers. Since floor space is precious and highly optimised, these poor sods are frequently squashed into high traffic areas to work with everyone sidling around them and grumbling. It was never pleasant in there but now it's definitely worse.

In the Waitrose (now using the scanning devices as well as automatic checkouts, with cashiers available) in a reasonably prosperous area of Yorkshire, there seems to be a definite increase in trained customer service. Fewer queues, clearly marked help and info points which are well staffed. It's working well.

I think another huge issue with these is the contribution to the loss of small pleasant daily social interactions. Even in supermarkets, you do at least talk to the cashier. The only reason I think you'd speak to an actual person here is if something went wrong. It's another little part of a dehumanising process that leads to the idea of workers as a resource, that you never have to actually deal with as people.
posted by tardigrade at 5:29 AM on December 6, 2016 [6 favorites]


*beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA *beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA *beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA
posted by applemeat at 5:41 AM on December 6, 2016 [4 favorites]


*beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA *beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA *beep* UNEXPECTED ITEM IN BAGGING AREA

They upgraded the Kroger near my home recently and part of that was putting in new self-checkouts (which, late enough at night, are often the only option). I tend to set off the bagging area monitor a LOT since I'll put a couple of sodas in a bag, remove the bag, place it in another bag (they'll snap and break otherwise), and then place it on the shelf, and previously that would require somebody passing by to tell the machine to leave it alone. Not a single issue since.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:01 AM on December 6, 2016


Well, I guess things will get nicer and easier for the rich while getting worse for the poor. Too bad we can't do anything about that, huh.
posted by Frowner at 6:06 AM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


You have to go to the Immoral Kiosk for that.

So much more unattractive!
posted by thelonius at 6:28 AM on December 6, 2016 [3 favorites]


Next iteration: throw in one of those Chinese police daleks to stop shoplifters.
posted by acb at 7:26 AM on December 6, 2016


Shoplifting appears to be stopped primarily by most people not being thieves, not by actual security features.

I wonder what proportion of “most people not being thieves” depends on them being primed for eusocial behaviour by encountering actual human beings working in the shop, rather than just a sterile space watched over by corporate machinery.
posted by acb at 7:29 AM on December 6, 2016 [4 favorites]


Well, I guess things will get nicer and easier for the rich while getting worse for the poor. Too bad we can't do anything about that, huh.

I get the general reaction to grah, but if you were Amazon— what would you have done differently? I mean, if Costco announced a new fancy store, that somehow made it to Metafilter but still required the membership fee, would you post the same comment, and again when Tesla announces a new car or solar initiative or even when that fancy vegan burger releases a new iteration? As we sit here posting on a site that requires a credit-card, smart-phone/computer and ample idle time.

Amazon has seemingly built a faster way to shop groceries for it's customers, that's it— now to me, that's valuable. If I were earning less then I currently am, it would be even more valuable because I'd likely have less time outside of work, and the time I could spend being with family, or just zoning out by the TV would bring me more happiness then standing in a line.

I think the core of the grah, is that we're rolling down a hill of automation, we all know it-- and that's going to cause tremendous changes in our society. As much as we're used to using ATM's and online banking to handle our cash, our grand-kids are going to be used to something akin to this Amazon experience.

But there's this fine line between doom and hope with that reality, and which side of that line that we fall is going to be chosen on a societal/governmental/activist level, and currently I don't think anyone is openly talking about that future as a reality.

If I close my eyes and picture a better future— I'm not thinking of people paid peanuts to move product from a cardboard box in a warehouse to a shelf on a shop floor. I'm not picturing a cashier scanning thousands of items a day, constantly on their feet, always worrying about shorts in their shift-end cashing up. I'd prefer those people doing something good!

The worry is that on a governmental level we're not talking about what it's going to take (universal basic income?) and all this in a world where a global super-power just elected a clown.
posted by Static Vagabond at 7:29 AM on December 6, 2016 [12 favorites]


Back in 1999, IBM had a very 1999 take on this concept yt .


Hey, it's Gabriel from Supernatural.
posted by SmileyChewtrain at 8:01 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Amazon has seemingly built a faster way to shop groceries for it's customers

I think Amazon has built a marginally faster way to shop for groceries. When I think about how my time for a trip to the grocery store is spent, checkout is usually under 5 minutes.

The only time I can remember it taking more than 10 minutes in recent memory involved a weird outlier situation where it was late at night, the self-scan lanes were closed, there was one checker, and a guy checking out was clearly trying to run some kind of scam where he was trying to buy as many prepaid credit cards as possible one at a time ("just one more" repeated a dozen times), probably to maximize the number he could buy before he hit the credit limit of whatever he was using to pay for it.

I'd guess the bulk of the time in any shopping trip is in actually getting to/into the store and getting around it selecting what I need. This changes a bit as I get to the edges (quick trips for a small number of items and involved trips for a very large number of items sometimes develop an annoying time-shopping to time-checking-out ratio), but for the common case, if I have to drive even an extra 5 minutes to get to a store with this, then I don't think it'd save me any time.

Are other people's experiences different?
posted by wildblueyonder at 8:30 AM on December 6, 2016


If I close my eyes and picture a better future— I'm not thinking of people paid peanuts to move product from a cardboard box in a warehouse to a shelf on a shop floor. I'm not picturing a cashier scanning thousands of items a day, constantly on their feet, always worrying about shorts in their shift-end cashing up. I'd prefer those people doing something good!

This techno-utopian vision of a labor-free future, where people are unshackled from the mindless burden of physical labor and are free to do something "better" like paint pictures or cure diseases or whatever, is quite simply never going to happen. Everyone needs something to do. The more things to do you automate away, the more people have nothing to do. People with nothing to do also have no income. So: Universal Basic Income! But from whence the money? Giant automated retailers with an ever-dwindling workforce and ever-higher profits. It starts to sound a lot like the Company Store, doesn't it?

I mean, I hope very much that I'm just making the same argument that people made against the industrial revolution or the advent of self-serve gas stations. But the scale and pace of the impending automation boom makes me think more of Elysium than, say, Wall-E.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:31 AM on December 6, 2016


Everyone needs something to do.

But do they need to be compelled by the threat of destitution and starvation to do it?
posted by acb at 8:46 AM on December 6, 2016 [9 favorites]


The annoying thing is, if we could get everyone to work together there are lots of things that can occupy essentially unlimited numbers of people, like ecological remediation, or art.

Unfortunately I think it is more likely that everyone is either going to end up working in jobs that oppose one another, like advertising. Or there will just be a ton of servants for the rich.
posted by Mitrovarr at 9:08 AM on December 6, 2016


Completely missing from their promotional video:
  1. Children.
  2. Kinder Eggs.
  3. Children and Kinder Eggs together.
I assume that the machine learning algorithms were not able to handle these complex edge cases. Does squashing the Kinder Egg and putting it back count as buying it? What about when five of them roll under the display case?

Not to mention shopping carts, or that time your kids took off running with someone else's shopping cart. What does computer vision have to say about that?
posted by clawsoon at 9:28 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


if I have to drive even an extra 5 minutes to get to a store with this, then I don't think it'd save me any time.
Are other people's experiences different?


Logic aside, people feel differently about time when they feel like they are in control and when they feel like they are not. 5 minutes deciding whether I want the cage free or the organic eggs this week is my time to spend. 5 minutes waiting for the extreme couponer in front of me to navigate his $500 for $-3.02 transaction labyrinth is time stolen.

AmazonGo, right now, is a pop-up gimmick. In a few years the initial bugs will get worked out and the technology will start rolling out more widely. I'm not sure I'd travel farther to get to one (the way that I will for, say, Costco). But in a given retail area, I might choose the Go-enabled store as opposed to the more traditional store next door if I find the user experience to be more convenient.
posted by sparklemotion at 9:33 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Completely missing from their promotional video

clawsoon, we're not allowed to have Kinder Eggs here. I'm not kidding. And I am bitter.
posted by fiercecupcake at 9:40 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Are other people’s experiences different?

You’re asking for anecdata, so given the size of the population you’re going to get some contradictory experiences to your own no matter what.

So, that said, yes: I’ve certainly been on shopping trips where I’ve spent more time in line than I have perusing the shelves. But, perhaps more importantly -at least from Amazon’s point of view- the part of a shopping trip that irritates me the most is the time spent in line. It is the portion that sticks in memory as a constant factor of bother. There may be subtler, more practical ways of improving my experience - better layout of aisles, etc. - but without a doubt the perception that any time spent in line is completely wasted makes it the most vexing.

Furthermore, it’s the easiest part to blame on the store itself. If I find the layout confusing, I’ll probably just put that on me. If there’s only one or two registers open and the self-checkout is clogged, I’ll put that on the store. There could well be a dozen things wrong with how Amazon lays out their new shops, but if checkout is indeed painless I probably won’t care.

Completely missing from their promotional video: Children.

This is hella true, and now I’m really wondering how they’ll handle that problem.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:56 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


This is hella true, and now I’m really wondering how they’ll handle that problem.

They'll handle it by only deploying this for corporate cafeterias and in areas where there are very few children. The world is a really huge place.
posted by GuyZero at 10:05 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


> Or there will just be a ton of servants for the rich.

Oh, you're going to wish you could be a servant for the rich. Why would the rich hire people when they could have robots? Cheaper and no backtalk.
posted by looli at 10:12 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Everyone needs something to do. The more things to do you automate away, the more people have nothing to do. People with nothing to do also have no income. So: Universal Basic Income! But from whence the money?

Okay, so you perfectly demonstrate the idea I'm trying to get at, and get my head around.

I think we can all agree that as a species we're going to continue to improve robotics and software intelligence going forward. If we agree on that, then we also agree that it means there is a point in the future where a robot/software will be able to do person A's job.

It doesn't matter really what job you pick-- at some point in a near, mid or far sci-fi future, a robot/machine mind will be able to do it. The time-frame might take a decade for one job (truck/taxi/train transport), or two hundred for another (world-acclaimed musician?) but that's a basic truth right?

So if you can agree that we've not hit peak-computing yet, you can't just say "This techno-utopian vision of a labor-free future, where people are unshackled from the mindless burden of physical labor and are free to do something "better" like paint pictures or cure diseases or whatever, is quite simply never going to happen."

Because, it is-- at some point, you're totally right it might not be a utopia, and it certainly won't be if it's not planned for. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your outlook, the first swings of that automation hammer are going to tend to hit those sectors that currently employ the larger swaths of the workforce doing the more generic labour. So, the big question is, if that's the future that's coming, how do we start shaping society so people have something to do and maybe most importantly, why does that something have to be an analog for work?

If you picture an Elysium future as the most likely end-goal today, then what's required to push the goal-posts to more of a Wall-E existence?
posted by Static Vagabond at 10:29 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


I meant the utopian vision, not a world where people have been automated out of their usefulness. That is most definitely on the menu.

Given that our techno-future is in the hands of extremely wealthy corporations beholden only to their institutional shareholders (i.e. other large fiscal entities), there is nothing we can do about it except support labor unions. But more likely than not we will experience a mass or near-mass extinction event in the near future, probably bacterial, which will set us back so far that the problem of a listless citizenry will be the least of our concerns.
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:36 AM on December 6, 2016


looli: "Why would the rich hire people when they could have robots? Cheaper and no backtalk."

The polite answer is status signifier. Less polite is some people enjoy lording it over others. And sadly some enjoy abusing people.
posted by Mitheral at 10:41 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


When I think about how my time for a trip to the grocery store is spent, checkout is usually under 5 minutes.

This is not my experience, I often go to the supermarket to pick up one or two items and the checkouts all usually have lines. Perhaps I live near very busy supermarkets but I only experience quick checkouts when I shop early in the morning. Even on the rare occasions where I'm shopping during the workday, the lines are full of stay-at-home-parents, freelancers, retirees, etc. This new Amazon store concept is my dream, the only downside is that you have less human interaction, which may be an upside for the target demographic.

The thing is, my partner and I both have non-routine cognitive jobs that will likely be the last to be automated, so I don't feel a deep sense of existential dread when I see developments like this. I really feel for those who don't have the cognitive abilities and/or educational opportunities to do that type of work. Our society is going to leave a large chunk of people without useful work to do as this trend continues, and I'm not convinced that everyone is capable or willing to do the creative non-routine work that can't be automated away. I've heard some promising things about UBI, but again, I'm not convinced that it will replace all the benefits that useful work gives a person.
posted by sid at 11:05 AM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Perhaps I live near very busy supermarkets but I only experience quick checkouts when I shop early in the morning

I suppose it might also be different habits for me -- because I live in LA, in order to keep from going insane, I've scheduled most of my life so that I am driving as a little as possible (and consequently, not running a lot of errands) at what might usually be thought of as peak hours. Still, even my occasional early evening visits seem to be fast-checkout. Then again, I also live 4 grocery stores inside a 5 minute radius (one on foot), so it could also be that everybody has a lot of places they could go.

I really feel for those who don't have the cognitive abilities and/or educational opportunities to do that type of work.

Was just talking the other day to a friend who is working on guided/semi-automated software development. Discovery has been partly automated for years now. I think most of the current workforce will probably make it to retirement before most of the non-routine cognitive labor demand is hollowed out (assuming the retirement landscape doesn't massively change, which is not a given, since Paul Ryan and the Republicans have every ambition to sacrifice it on the holy altar of tax cuts for the richest), but I don't think it's safe to assume the labor market for thinky jobs is going to stay safe from impact.
posted by wildblueyonder at 12:20 PM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


I wonder how much of this, if any, is selection bias due to people simply tweeting complaints when they stand in line, about standing in line, because it's hard to tweet and complain while actually shopping.
posted by rhizome at 12:25 PM on December 6, 2016


They'll handle it by only deploying this for corporate cafeterias and in areas where there are very few children. The world is a really huge place.

The world is a really huge place, and that’s quite possible, but if this only shows up in “places with really few children” then I think the panic in this thread is even more overwrought than normal.
posted by Going To Maine at 12:38 PM on December 6, 2016


Not going unless they stock Tuscan whole milk, 50 gallon barrels of lube, and 3 wolf t-shirts. I've come to expect certain things from Amazon.
posted by Ber at 12:45 PM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


Self-checkout has pretty much been killing cashiers off anyway, while sneakily forcing customers to do the same job.

I've never understood this viewpoint. I consider it a benefit not to have to bother with chatty, judgmental, and fake-friendly cashiers who act like I should enjoy paying for the privilege of being forced to deal with them. Okay, so maybe their jobs are boring and likely low-paid but I don't know why the customer has to take the hit for it. That said, grocery shopping at an Amazon store doesn't appeal to me at all because I think they probably already know too much about me as it is. So what if I want to eat Tostitos and drink bottled tea while reading the free Kindle book I just downloaded as my cat lays on top of their new cat scratcher lounge delivered in two days via Amazon Prime?
posted by fuse theorem at 3:53 PM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


Judgemental cashiers are more of a Whole Foods thing to me, as opposed to the Targets and Home Depots that are most aggressively rolling out self-checkout. That is, it's not about the interactions. it's about massive corporations shaving micropennies off their cost structure. At any rate I don't think I've ever experienced taking a "hit" for this, but I would imagine it would happen if I was on food stamps or similar. How does self-checkout deal with food stamp coupons? I want to guess "not," or "requires attendant interaction anyway," but I don't know.
posted by rhizome at 3:59 PM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


The average retail store is unlikely to ever remove cashiers completely. Just as banks have moved a huge fraction of routine transactions from tellers to ATMs yet tellers are still around for non-routine things. Similarly, the Amazon corner store will only stock a limited number of things and handle a limited (possibly single) methods of payment yet Safeway/Vons/WF/etc will have a mix of cashiers and automated checkouts. It's unlikely to be a strict either/or in our lifetimes.

Of course, cutting 50% of the cashiers out of the US workforce is still a pretty huge move.

And if it makes you feel any better, a couple decades ago there were no jobs making coffee. I mean, there were waitresses and donut store clerks, but there weren't three baristas on every city block in every major US metro. Something will arise that people don't want done mechanically.
posted by GuyZero at 4:42 PM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Self-checkout has pretty much been killing cashiers off anyway, while sneakily forcing customers to do the same job.

I've never understood this viewpoint. I consider it a benefit not to have to bother with chatty, judgmental, and fake-friendly cashiers who act like I should enjoy paying for the privilege of being forced to deal with them.

Sorry to be unclear here - I’m not saying that I like dealing with cashiers over self-checkout; rather, self-checkout literally makes me do the job that is otherwise done by a cashier using a roughly identical terminal. My point was simply that cashiers already seem to be on the outs in quite a few grocery stores and the number is likely to increase. Amazon Go is simply an accelerant.
posted by Going To Maine at 4:58 PM on December 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


Judgemental cashiers are more of a Whole Foods thing to me,

It happened to me just today, in a Whole Foods-type place that markets itself as being less snooty than Whole Foods. The cashier stopped scanning my stuff to pick up something I was buying, hold it up like they were doing a presentation on it, make an unnecessary snarky comment about it, and then wait until I responded before continuing with the checkout. I paid for the privilege of having that happen.

as opposed to the Targets and Home Depots that are most aggressively rolling out self-checkout.

Home Depot's self-checkout has its "issues" too. I've had a clerk come grab my stuff and insist on scanning it for me. Not ask me first if I needed the help (which I didn't), but just take over like we were in the regular checkout lane. It was around the time there were a number of news reports about how people were particularly hitting Home Depot to shoplift and were often using the self-checkout lanes to do it. So, I've often wondered if for some reason I looked like a criminal to clerk in question.

That is, it's not about the interactions. it's about massive corporations shaving micropennies off their cost structure.

And yet the Safeways and Albertsons in my area have removed all their self-checkout lanes after claiming they wanted to get to know their customers better or some b.s. Given that their offerings tend to be more expensive relative to the other local grocery chains, I'm thinking not having self-checkout helps them justify their higher prices.
posted by fuse theorem at 4:59 PM on December 6, 2016


And yet the Safeways and Albertsons in my area have removed all their self-checkout lanes after claiming they wanted to get to know their customers better or some b.s.

Now this is interesting to me. I’d love to get a story from the trenches about where self-checkout has failed to take-off and why.
posted by Going To Maine at 5:02 PM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


I doubt it's any more complicated than the maintenance costs and loss of floorspace were too great for the amount that people used them.

It happened to me just today

Does that WF-like store even have self-checkout? That's kind of my point, that the snooty stores don't have self-checkout anyway.
posted by rhizome at 5:12 PM on December 6, 2016


I doubt it's any more complicated than the maintenance costs and loss of floorspace were too great for the amount that people used them.

On a purely economic level I agree - but where would that be? What communities can’t make self-checkout work? Why not?
posted by Going To Maine at 5:26 PM on December 6, 2016


What communities can’t make self-checkout work? Why not?

Communities with bad self-checkout service technicians. Communities with a lot of theft. Communities where most people make large purchases that are more efficiently handled by a cashier vs small-purchase self-checkout users. I too am curious what the specific reasons are.
posted by GuyZero at 5:29 PM on December 6, 2016


Does that WF-like store even have self-checkout? That's kind of my point, that the snooty stores don't have self-checkout anyway.

Nah, this particular chain markets itself as a "regular folks" version of Whole Foods. I'm thinking it would be great if they had self-checkout because some of their clerks are too friendly in a way that can be annoying if not offensive.

On a purely economic level I agree - but where would that be? What communities can’t make self-checkout work? Why not?

A community that's basically an overgrown resort town where the permanent residents are largely upper middle class or flat out wealthy. Those people don't want to do their own checkout and some of them probably get offended at the very notion. Meanwhile, plenty of us rubes happily use the self-checkout lanes and I've rarely been in a store when those lanes weren't busy. It's possible though that a problematic amount of theft has been going on too.
posted by fuse theorem at 9:57 PM on December 6, 2016


Meh. The institution with which I am currently associated has been doing something like this for a couple years now. See, they opened a new satellite campus down the freeway from our main campus. But apparently nobody really wanted to spring for the additional operational costs associated with an impressive new 200,000 square foot state-of-the-art facility. So for a few months, someone on the main campus safety or facilities staff would get assigned to make the 20-25 minute commute down there once or twice a day to make sure nothing was burning down or flooding. And to this day, as I understand it, the one commissary on campus serves clientele of its generous selection of pre-packaged convenience-store-quality foodstuffs by means of a single self-service checkout station with a security camera pointed at.
posted by bunbury at 10:21 PM on December 6, 2016 [2 favorites]


Well, I guess things will get nicer and easier for the rich while getting worse for the poor. Too bad we can't do anything about that, huh.

So... What are the prospects like for having a store like this near you and hiring someone to pick up and deliver your groceries?
posted by bile and syntax at 11:05 AM on December 7, 2016


Self-checkout has pretty much been killing cashiers off anyway, while sneakily forcing customers to do the same job.

If by "forcing" you mean "allowing". As someone who prefers self-checkout in most situations, I don't understand the righteous indignation of people who think I shouldn't have that option.

I can pretty much guarantee there will be human beings performing service jobs long after it becomes more cost-effective to automate those jobs. Being served by a person will be more expensive and/or less convenient than being served by a machine, but the option will be there as long as customers are willing to pay for it.
posted by shponglespore at 4:48 PM on December 7, 2016


"This would be a completely awesome way to run a store if all the profits went to a central repository, then got evenly divided among the members of the store's local community"

I'm pretty sure something like this already exists, I remember reading something about a rural community taking over a local store and having a means for people to let themselves in.

Its not really so different from a honesty box and they work pretty well. I knew someone who ran a kind of grocery stall outside his house. He would visit the wholesalers in the morning then bag things up with a price on them and you would stick the money through his letter box. There was nothing to stop people just walking off with stuff but he paid his mortgage this way.
posted by tallus at 9:57 PM on December 7, 2016 [1 favorite]


Our work cafeteria put in self-checkouts a few months ago and got rid of at least one cashier (someone's always on duty for the people who want to pay cash or talk to another human for some reason). There's also a "convenience store" on-site that is open 24 hours. After 5 pm it's sort of on the honor system - there's a kiosk and also cameras, but nothing to physically stop you. Evidently they haven't lost much, since it's still open. There aren't many people in the building overnight though, and you can't get into the building without a badge so there aren't any randos walking in off the street.
posted by AFABulous at 7:48 AM on December 8, 2016


On another note - I've been thinking about self-check-out, Amazon deliveries, etc, in general as I experience them, and I don't think they're good for me.

Many people on here comment that they hate talking to cashiers (and not just rude cashiers; I should add that I shop at a Cub in a low-income neighborhood and have never encountered a rude cashier there). I hate talking to cashiers too. I hate interacting with strangers. (I also hate talking on the phone.) In my conscious mind, I like nothing less than idle chat when I'm not feeling it. I'm very introverted and also kind of anxious/depressive.

But when I try to look at my life from the outside, I notice that ghosting through life never talking to strangers is less stressful in the moment but erodes a lot of my life skills. Interacting with strangers is a life skill, being able to have a conversation about nothing much at the drop of a hat is useful, being able to manage the stress of doing so is useful, being able to solve the small problems of human interaction on the fly is useful. Interacting with people who are not me is a first step to interacting with people who are not like me, and no matter how much I am all thinky about people who are not like me, actually talking to them is better.

On one hand, it's kind of horrible that a lot of the "I work shitty jobs" people I know are people I chat with when they're in a service relationship to me, but on the other hand, it seems politically better that these people are physically real to me than that they are totally invisible. (I mean, I have friends my own age (ie, too old for shitty jobs to be a phase) who are career precariat, but they're usually working class weirdos who I know from arts stuff and politics.)

It often seems to me that the rich want to be served only by people (or robots) who don't remind them of class inequality merely by existing in the flesh - like, it's fun to have the barrista be some girl who is working while going to the local liberal arts college, and that doesn't remind you of poverty because she's on her way to being just like you. It's depressing to see someone mired in poverty because you pay them terrible wages to serve you. Replace those people with young people or robots, keep the truly poor behind the scenes and your whole experience is much more fun.

Grocery stores (and bookstores, etc) are some of the few places where you can pick and choose a bit so that you can control the interaction a little. I have a general sense of the cashiers at my Cub and I know that I'm very unlikely to hear a lot of racist or otherwise hateful garbage from them; if I do hear it, I can complain. I'm not going to get punched in the face by a cashier for wearing a BLM button. If I go to a small business that I actually like, I may interact with strangers who basically share my worldview.

It's not that everyone has the spoons to deal with strangers, or that everyone has access to relatively safe and non-horrible places to shop. But at the same time, I feel like my actual lived experience is poorer when I can just sortition myself into only the social interactions I choose.
posted by Frowner at 8:17 AM on December 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


I have to say that this thread has moved me away from being an extremist about SCO (can I make this a thing) on the basis of interaction preferences.

I guess most of what bugs me about it is how these poor employees have to walk around nearly-futiley telling people that SCO is available. That, and understaffing the lines in general.
posted by rhizome at 8:52 AM on December 8, 2016


DISRUPT EMPLOYMENT
posted by duffell at 2:45 AM on December 10, 2016


One answer as to why some stores may not have, or may have removed, self-checkouts: unionized staff. This is apparently the case at the Safeway nearest me, to the frustration of at least some folks who shop there.
posted by attercoppe at 8:23 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]


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