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Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

gizmodo.com

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Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#621

Post by skhunted »

h0l0cube wrote: post #550
skhunted wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Globalization was largely a response to environmental movements in the U.S. We offshored our pollution generation.

Uh, really? I was certain that the aftermath of WWII was responsible for establishing a form of global governance (by consensus) via the UN, and then there’s the benefits of free trade agreements that drove economic globalization.

The free trade agreements came after the environmental movements. Claiming environmental movements caused this is too strong a claim. But it is not entirely a coincidence that one followed the other.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#622

Post by gruez »

account-5 wrote: post #614
gruez wrote: post #610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're trying to derail the discussion to something about "value", because the page I linked about "skill" has a passage about how skilled laborers were historically important to the economy? What does this have to do with the subjectivity/objectivity of "underpaid", "unfair wages", "unskilled labor", or whether a burger flipper is more "skilled" than an accountant? As I said earlier, even if you think that accoun…

First I'm pivoting now I'm trying to derail, when all I've done is answer you question; but to make it plain: yes, it's subjective. How else are certain skills valued more that others? There's no objective measurement to these. Comparing the skills of one disapline to another doesn't work, like apple to oranges.

The objective measurement for "skill" is how much training/experience/talent is required to carry out a particular job. Sure, there might be some fuzziness/ambiguity to this, and there's various degrees of freedom to how you compute a "skill score" or whatever (eg. what's more skilled an accountant or an auditor?), but it's hard to argue that a burger flipper is more skilled than an accountant. You can make the argument that the value of a burger flipper vs an accountant is subjective, but that's irrespective of the skill required.

Whether someone is getting "underpaid" or a "fair wage" on the other hand is entirely subjective, and you can come to whatever conclusion you want depending on your politics. On one side of the spectrum you could argue any sort of situation where the employer is capturing surplus value from the employee is inherently exploitative[1] and therefore "underpaid" and a "unfair wage". On the other end of the spectrum you argue that supply and demand curves are the ultimate arbiter of what's "fair", and any wage that is determined by the free market can't by "underpaid" or "unfair" by definition.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#623

Post by astura »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #277
saalweachter wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the "if anything goes wrong you now stand around with your thumb up your ass while one employee makes their way from broken kiosk to broken kiosk to manually resolve the problems" model has soured me on self-checkout. I find I have a very low "dealing with this bullshit" limit, to the point that if I have trouble I'm likely to just say fuck it and walk out of the store without completing my purchase.

Having used the UK/US type self checkout machines while travelling, I must say it is so nice to live in Northern Europe where the self checkout machines are largely just based on trust, with randomly sampling ~five items of every 100 shoppers. There is no weighing at any of the stores. If you don't get randomly selected for inspection, there is nothing stopping you from just walking out with groceries you didn't pay…

You can't makes broad, sweeping generalizations like "UK/US type self checkout." It varies so much.

I live in the US and the only place I ever go to where they weigh the items you scanned is Costco. Everywhere else I go (my local Walmart, Target, Aldi, two local grocery stores, and CVS) the self checkout is mostly based on trust with maybe one employee somewhat monitoring some machines. No random sampling.

The only issue I ever run into with the self checkouts is double scanning the product. You do need employee to void items.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#624

Post by LudwigNagasena »

chrash wrote: post #521
jrpt wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Come on, it isn’t anything to do with being a “marketing stunt.” Often products like this are expected to lose money at first, but they hope with enough R&D and scale that they can make it successful eventually. For example, you are pointing out that annotating is costly, but that’s an expense that scales independently of the number of stores. So with enough scale it wouldn’t be as big a deal. Or if they figured out…

right, that's how it starts. but the improvements in methodology simply aren't there as the ML sector has been laser focused on generality in modeling (GenAI as it's affectionately known). "at scale" doesn't just mean more stores; it means more products and thus more annotation. how many UPCs do you figure there are in a given Target or Whole Foods? i assure you it's in the millions. one advantages of the Amazon Go i…

GenAI means Generative AI, not General AI.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#625

Post by pas »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #331
op00to wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Target allegedly has such good video capabilities they can recognize repeat thieves, keep a record of what they steal, and wait until it reaches felony level after multiple trips before they flag a person to be detained. All in super duper high definition.

All that money down the drain now that people just wear hoodies and facemasks to shoplift

why are they not employing the fearless mall cops to ask people to take off their hoodies as they are running away with the loot?

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#626

Post by pas »

hot_gril wrote: post #138
frakkingcylons wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a huge advantage if you don’t have to wait in line for self checkout machines or human checkout.

I don't feel like checking out is any faster than it used to be. They replace 10 human checkout lanes with maybe 15 self-checkout lanes and 2 human checkout. Maybe the self-checkout is a cheaper so they can have more, but people are so much slower on those that it doesn't win in the end. Dunno if the store is even really incentivized to make checkout fast, given that they sell high-margin stuff in the lines. Maybe on…

self-checkout (at least in Hungary) is just clunky compared to the regular conveyor belt and chute setup, so no wonder the pros with the pro gear are faster :)

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#627

Post by cdchn »

nottorp wrote: post #180
cdchn wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I often don't bring my bags with me, because I'm going to have to load everything into the car anyway. Thats an interesting optimization. Don't bag your stuff in the store just walk out with a cart of loose groceries. Especially for someone who simply MUST bring all the groceries inside with one trip, I can just load up a crate.

Always did that. But I keep large, solid, reusable bags in the trunk.

I've pretty much given up on reusable bags. I almost always do grocery shopping at random times, and never bring my bags with me when I leave the house.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#628

Post by cdchn »

rootusrootus wrote: post #154
cdchn wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I often don't bring my bags with me, because I'm going to have to load everything into the car anyway. Thats an interesting optimization. Don't bag your stuff in the store just walk out with a cart of loose groceries. Especially for someone who simply MUST bring all the groceries inside with one trip, I can just load up a crate.

Back in the days when we got plastic shopping bags, I considered it an art form to see if I could get an entire trunk load of groceries into the house in a single trip. Without squishing the bread. You can get a lot of bags on your arms, and one or two jugs of milk in each hand depending on how long your fingers are. It just isn't as fun with the reusable folding bags. Or the paper bags some retailers use -- the ones…

Plastic bags were great, I could hook as many as I could lift on a padded carabiner.

With mandatory paper bags they seem to have made them as flimsy as possible. I can't go grocery shopping when its raining any more, the bags just turn into mush at the slightest drizzle.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#629

Post by P_I_Staker »

ricardobeat wrote: post #368
bilalq wrote: post #190

This is pretty sad to read. Before Covid, the Amazon Go store experience was phenomenal. All the convenience of a 7-Eleven but with the pricing of a normal grocery store. The food options were really good and the BlueApron style meal-kits were amazing. The Alexa integration was also nice for being able to just verbally ask what's the next step on a recipe while you're busy stirring or chopping things. When it rolled…

Self-checkout is seamless in Europe. I don't see anything that would stop the US from having the same.

It is NOT seamless. Same issues, and more, but worse service, as is customary in EU.

Re: Amazon ditches 'just walk out' checkouts at its grocery stores

#630

Post by pas »

annexrichmond wrote: post #249
steelframe wrote: post #227

Cool. Now can I pay with cash? Because I'm not going to let anyone build a profile on whether I like warming lube or just regular lube, how much sugar and alcohol I consume, what kind of romance novels I read, how often I floss, and whether I feel I can afford organic fruit.

I think it should be a fundamental right to pay for goods with cash.

no, no, because you can just grow your own, or just buy guns with cash and use them to exchange them to food. (and if it's not interstate no need for paperwork, right? - in freedom states)
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