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Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

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Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#121

Post by noasaservice »

joezydeco wrote: post #81
chongli wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also needs to be said that similar machines provided by Taylor to McDonalds' competitors do not have anywhere close to the amount of downtime that McDonalds' machines have. There's also ample evidence that software updates to Taylor's McDonalds machines have made the error codes more cryptic and the machines more unreliable over time. I think there's a pretty strong legal case to be made that these machines are de…

"It also needs to be said that similar machines provided by Taylor to McDonalds' competitors do not have anywhere close to the amount of downtime that McDonalds' machines have" But they're not similar machines. The machines in question are models developed for McDonald's that use internal heat treatment to pasteurize the machine and clean it on a more frequent basis. The intent was to keep the machine running longer…

> Source: I've done engineering work on the C602. I know how it works.

After watching the videos on how these machines work, and all the hidden menus within hidden menus with self-sabotaging software/hardware....

Admitting you have dev'ed on this is plainly disgusting. As a fellow engineer, we need to put our foot down and not work for places that institute such unethical and/or illegal behaviors. The faster companies are starved out for *trying* to institute unethical computing, the better.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#122

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

throwaway73838 wrote: post #117
Nition wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is maybe backed up by the fact that in other countries, McDonalds serves the same ice-cream from machines that seem to always be working. The "McDonalds ice-cream machine is always broken" meme seems to be a uniquely US phenomenon - or at least it's not completely worldwide.

Definitely true in Australia. You very often can’t get ice cream after a certain time of night.

They run the machine dry so that it can be cleaned out daily without wasting product.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#123

Post by Topgamer7 »

cletus wrote: post #56

I really don't understand how McDonald's board and leadership has let this situation happen and continue. These ice cream machines are the printer cartridges of McDonald's. Pointless DRM and obfuscation designed to maximize authorized call outs (with associated costs). Now you can argue taht McDonalds gets a cut of that (which may or may not be true; I just don't know) but all of this comes at the cost of customer ex…

The pessimist in me says someone who sits on the board has a stake in the ice cream machine company, and they make bank on the crazy service fees for each tech they send out to "fix" the machines.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#124

Post by ska »

Regardless of the technical or business merits of the device, there is a lesson in this for anyone building a product that effectively depends on the co-operation of a much bigger player.

Doing this with their enthusiastic co-operation has to be the best path. Doing it in the face of an antagonistic relationship is really risky.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#125

Post by registeredcorn »

sandworm101 wrote: post #109
gknoy wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this mean that the ice cream machines at other places are just happily dispensing unsafe food?

No. It means that they just open up and clean the machine each day, just like every other appliance that touches food. The MD machine was designed to run without daily cleaning.

I'm sorry, I'm not quite following:

Employees do clean these machines every day, but because of how it's designed they don't need to do so?

Is this something kind of like: I can change my motor oil every 500 miles my car is driven, but according to the manufacturer I don't need to do so that often?

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#126

Post by registeredcorn »

14 wrote: post #104
gruez wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There's also ample evidence that software updates to Taylor's McDonalds machines have made the error codes more cryptic and the machines more unreliable over time. Source? >It also needs to be said that similar machines provided by Taylor to McDonalds' competitors do not have anywhere close to the amount of downtime that McDonalds' machines have >I think there's a pretty strong legal case to be made that these machi…

I don’t know the source but definitely did read an article here on HN last year reporting this. Call me a conspiracy theorist but I would bet McDonald’s is paying a pr firm to get reports like that taken away off the net.

If you do find the article, please let us know.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#127

Post by stickfigure »

sandworm101 wrote: post #111
stickfigure wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, you are going to be horrified when you find out what goes on inside a family-run restaurant or food cart. They actually make food using humans .

That is the difference between family business and industrial food production. The cleaning products used in small restaurants are basically harmless. A little bleach residue in someone's food will taste horrible but probably won't kill anyone. Glycol tastes like sugar. It very much will do harm if it leaks into the food. But using glycol allows a food producer to reduce labor costs via automation, automation being a…

As a sibling comment mentioned, polypropylene glycol ethylene glycol. Polypropylene glycol is an FDA approved food additive and one of the main ingredients of vape fluid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylene_glycol

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#128

Post by vkou »

infogulch wrote: post #99
joezydeco wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It also needs to be said that similar machines provided by Taylor to McDonalds' competitors do not have anywhere close to the amount of downtime that McDonalds' machines have" But they're not similar machines. The machines in question are models developed for McDonald's that use internal heat treatment to pasteurize the machine and clean it on a more frequent basis. The intent was to keep the machine running longer…

The fact that the design intent is to reduce downtime does not mean it is achieved in practice. McDonald's ice cream machines constantly being "broken" is so well known that it's a meme among normal people. This is not the case for other fast food places that use Taylor machines. I've seen statements from employees confused about why it's such a big deal to clean the machine once a day because it's not that hard. (Pe…

In practice, there's a huge difference between someone at corporate buying machines that don't work as well as expected, and a shadowy deal where someone at corporate is getting kickbacks from the vendor for buying a deliberately sabotaged machine.

The former is just the normal sort of shit that a franchise has to deal with, the latter is what a lot of people, myself included thought this issue was... But I've turned my thinking around on this.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#129

Post by rrrrrrrrrrrryan »

registeredcorn wrote: post #125
sandworm101 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It means that they just open up and clean the machine each day, just like every other appliance that touches food. The MD machine was designed to run without daily cleaning.

I'm sorry, I'm not quite following: Employees do clean these machines every day, but because of how it's designed they don't need to do so? Is this something kind of like: I can change my motor oil every 500 miles my car is driven, but according to the manufacturer I don't need to do so that often?

No, the McDonald's machines heat up any leftover milkshake mixture every night to kill all the bacteria in it, then cool it all back down before the morning.

If it hasn't been run in the last 24 hours, the machine will refuse to dispense ice cream unless you run the process (which takes a few hours).

Non-McDonald's machines work how your imagining: you have to toss the leftover ice cream once it goes bad, disassemble the machine and clean it by hand, then load new ice cream into it.

Re: Ice cream machine hackers sue McDonald's

#130

Post by kube-system »

tfvlrue wrote: post #26

I've been following this story for a while. When people say the soft serve machine is "broken", they really mean "unavailable to serve ice cream to customers". That could mean something as innocuous as performing a pasteurization cycle during the day (because it failed to run at night for some reason, perhaps the machine's clock is set wrong). It could also mean there is a physical problem with some part of the machi…

"Broken" is simply the colloquial term used to avoid arguments with customers. Clarity is a much higher customer-service priority than precision.
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