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“Just walk out” technology by Amazon

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Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#761

Post by panarky »

JohnFen wrote: post #717
panarky wrote: post #707

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon Go stores have plenty of employees, I'd bet they're not saving anything on labor. The benefit is a much better customer experience, not labor savings.

> The benefit is a much better customer experience, not labor savings. The primary benefit is access to a lot better data about shoppers, not a better customer experience.

I'll choose the store where I can grab what I want and walk out over the store where I have to wait in a dumb ass line while the cashier yells for a price check and the customer in front of me can't remember her PIN so slowly counts out nickels and quarters.

It's a massive competitive advantage far beyond whatever data they get by watching me roam the store.

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#762

Post by zepto »

airstrike wrote: post #760
zepto wrote: post #751

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it on all of us? Why should Amazon reap the benefit of this innovation while the rest of us pay for the consquences?

Amazon doesn't rip the benefits alone, all of us do. Just like Apple doesn't benefit alone from having invented touch-screen smartphones. And if these companies profit, they do so as a reward for spending the capital (dollars and manhours) in creating new technologies that improve productivity. Specifically total factor productivity in https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobb%E2%80%93Douglas_product... It's on all of us…

Are you seriously trying to suggest that everyone benefits from these innovations?

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#763

Post by GnomeErcy »

laughinghan wrote: post #649
pacala wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GMail solved a thorny problem: convince users to browse the web while logged in, preferably with their real life identity. To then collect and aggregate an extensive personalized dossier of their online activity without any fear of legal repercussions. This is priceless. Then just play the trends: how much space the median user actually uses, user adoption trends, planned storage capacity, storage cost. Possibly the…

I'm not saying Google isn't evil, but I don't buy this particular piece of conspiracy theory. Every major browser including Google Chrome is starting to phase out third-party cookies, which prevents exactly that kind of tracking.

Except that Google can essentially track individual Chrome installations and all the activity that happens on that, so blocking third party cookies doesn't necessarily mean that Google can't track you...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22236106

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#764

Post by jvagner »

mkolodny wrote: post #610
derefr wrote: post #528

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surprising to me that Whole Foods still doesn't have this tech integrated. You'd think that'd be the "beta" step after the Amazon Store's "alpha" step.

Maybe they don't want to draw attention to how many people are going to lose their jobs because of this yet. Cashier is the #2 job in the US (by number of people employed) [0]. If they released this at Whole Foods, I'd guess they'd fire all the cashiers there. That would make this rollout a lot less exciting for a lot of people. I hope Amazon comes up with an awesome way to help the cashiers this technology replaces.…

I frequent Whole Foods, and I digital nomad a bit, so I visit a lot of Whole Foods-es.

Recently came back to the East Bay (SF) and the Whole Foods I'm staying near, more than the others, seems like a staging store for Buy Online & 1) Get Delivered, 2) Pick Up In Store.

There are often more WF employees shopping for pick-up orders than customers walking around the store. Navigating aisles that are full of these WF shoppers gives the store a pretty signficantly different feel than the other stores that I'm a regular at. Plus, the staging/storage area at the front for ready-orders is much bigger than at other stores.

Not as true at SF city WFs, or the ones in Reno, LA, Park City and Phoenix/Scottsdale that I'm familiar with.

I'm guessing this dynamic, plus "Just walk out" is where they're headed, at least in certain densities. And that's where some of the cashiers may be transitioned.

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#765

Post by airstrike »

zepto wrote: post #762
airstrike wrote: post #760

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon doesn't rip the benefits alone, all of us do. Just like Apple doesn't benefit alone from having invented touch-screen smartphones. And if these companies profit, they do so as a reward for spending the capital (dollars and manhours) in creating new technologies that improve productivity. Specifically total factor productivity in https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobb%E2%80%93Douglas_product... It's on all of us…

Are you seriously trying to suggest that everyone benefits from these innovations?

100%. Would you, personally, rather still be plowing with livestock?

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#767

Post by zepto »

airstrike wrote: post #765
zepto wrote: post #762

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you seriously trying to suggest that everyone benefits from these innovations?

100%. Would you, personally, rather still be plowing with livestock?

Irrelevant, but it’s telling that you have to go back so far to pick something that seems to be universally beneficial.

Are you seriously trying to suggest everyone benefits from Amazon’s innovations?

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#768

Post by laughinghan »

_8j50 wrote: post #654
laughinghan wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it already the norm that there are security cameras in retail stores to catch shoplifters? This doesn't really change that.

Yes. Recordings of video, not analysis of your movement and tracking people with their name,social information,history facial recognition and gait analysis. Is there a difference between a security guard watching you and a person walking around writing down every move you make, every facial expression,posture,gesture,mood,interaction and instantly applying sophisticated correlation in conjunction with thousands of hi…

Yes, but what does that have to do with "Just walk out"?

Grocery stores across the country could do (or may be already doing) all the creepy things you're describing without implementing "Just walk out", with the security cameras they already universally have installed. Or, they could implement "Just walk out" without doing any of those creepy things.

They're irrelevant to each other.

I don't see why you have a problem with "Just walk out", it seems to me like your problem is with the prevalence of security cameras. That's a valid criticism of, say, Ring, because it's pushing to increase the prevalence of home security cameras, but "Just walk out" isn't going to increase the prevalence of retail store security cameras, they're already ubiquitous.

Re: “Just walk out” technology by Amazon

#769

Post by ebauch »

Am I the only one thinking this no-checkout comes at a huge cost of extreme surveillance? This is creepy as fuck. I would never want it in a store, no matter how much time I save. The self checkout machines at CVS make checkout already x-times faster. This would only be a small gain a price I am not willing to pay. Also there is some satisfaction in paying for things/checking out.
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