Amazon Unveils 'Self-driving' Brick-and-Mortar Convenience Store (seattletimes.com) 123
Amazon announced Monday it has built a convenience store in downtown Seattle that deploys a gaggle of technologies similar to those used in self-driving cars to allow shoppers to come in, grab items and walk out without going through a register (Editor's note: the link could be paywalled; alternate source). From a report on Seattle Times: The 1,800 square-foot store, officially dubbed "Amazon Go," is the latest beach in brick-and-mortar retail stormed by the e-commerce giant, which already has bookstores and is working on secretive drive-through grocery locations. It's clearly a sign that Amazon sees a big opportunity in revolutionizing the staid traditions of Main Street commerce. Located on the corner of Seventh Avenue and Blanchard Street, the store is open to Amazon employees participating in a testing program. It is expected to be open to the public in early 2017.
We have those already in the US (Score:1)
also no 21 and up items can be sold with (Score:2)
also no 21 and up items can be sold with no one there and in some states you must use the full checkout lane.
Re: (Score:3)
Believe it or not, one of the arguments against allowing grocery stores to sell beer is that the grocery stores (who are very eager to sell beer) would have to hire people over 21 to ring people up.
It was an absurd argument and some day we'll be able to buy beer with our groceries in my state.
Re: (Score:1)
I hated being in New York (upstate) in the early 00s.
Yes, shitty beer at grocery stores, but I couldn't find a good beer anywhere, it was the worst Liquor system I've seen (short of dry counties).
I assume beer becoming trendy has made this a lot less of an issue over the last 10 - 15 years.
PA was a close second in shitty laws though.
This seems very different (Score:2)
I don't think there's a checkout in this model. You just fill your bag and walk out.
The self-service pay stations are a temp solution until they can be removed. IBM ran an ad in the 1990's that predicted the future for RFID technology - just grab items and walk out. Walmart tried to do it - requiring vendors to place RFID in all items. I don't know why the Walmart initiative failed.
Maybe technology has made the important step forward.
But you're correct - this is a labor saving initiative. People will b
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
The people at the self-checkout registers are there when the machine (or customer) screws up, or when there is some exception which requires human interaction (ie. the self-checkout register can't currently measure a length of wire, for example, and charge the correct amount per foot).
You can steal something anywhere in a store. I'm not sure why you'd do it at a register (there's more cameras in this area than anywhere else, to prevent theft of cash by employees).
Re: (Score:3)
You can steal something anywhere in a store. I'm not sure why you'd do it at a register (there's more cameras in this area than anywhere else, to prevent theft of cash by employees).
Plausible deniability*.
You go to the bakery section and self select a bunch of expensive pastries and place them in the non-seethrough (provided by the bakery) bag and then proceed to the self-service checkout. At that location you punch in the code for a much cheaper pastry. They system only works on a weight basis and accepts your code. So you get an instant discount that amounts to theft. Plus if you actually get caught (unlikely) you can easily blame the error on confusion in selecting the correct pr
Re: We have those already in the US (Score:4, Insightful)
Over here in the UK all that is plausible but the customer would still risk the public embarrassment. At Tesco supermarkets, about 1 in every 4 times I use the "Scan as you shop" portable device I get a random check at the till.
It's still practical shopping: I take one bag into the shop, scan the barcodes as I pick the products and use a specific group of tills (usually less busy) without having to take the stuff out of the bag. If I get delayed by the "random check" it's their staff that has to unpack and pack my items again. Not a huge problem for anyone involved.
The scan as a you shop is for registered shoppers only, so it would be silly to try fraud after scanning the loyalty card that links the products to your address and identity. Non-registered shoppers using the self-checkout tills possibly get more attention and more sensitive scales to be sure that the 100 grammes of cheap pastry is not really 102 grammes of expensive pastry or cheese.
Re: (Score:2)
nope, but I'd like to visit one day :)
Re: (Score:2)
No you don't. Some things [peopleofwalmart.com] are best left set to 'virtual'.
Re: (Score:2)
ahaha. :)
I've been keeping this [ridefree.com] in my bookmarks/bucket list for years. I don't think VR would be an acceptable replacement. Even if I have to dodge a few bullets here and there
Re: (Score:1)
Despite the insistence of one or more people to mod down everything I post, if you do decide to come over and will be somewhere in the New York City area, drop me a note beforehand. I can't promise you the world, but I'll do my best to get you oriented on how we move in this country.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks!
Re: (Score:2)
People who steal stuff from stores generally come up with elaborate, multi-step plans?
Supermarkets are structured differently than bank vaults. Why? Because stores are structured to facilitate trade and banks are structured to secure things.
Re: (Score:1)
You would be surprised. There are plenty of "lifter" forums out there where people brag and take photos about their hauls, usually from smaller Mom and Pop stores since they tend to have less security than the big stores. Most amusing thing was one guy talking about when he was going to do his next run... The store owner was an acquaintance of mine, so I let him know. Said person's next post on the forum was how the LP guys were onto him and how he was facing felony larceny charges.
Re: (Score:2)
The original statement was that, in the US, there's a person sitting there to stop theft. In what way would having a person keeping an eye on the self-checkout lane stop that from happening?
Re: (Score:2)
Do they check ID's when you try to buy beer?
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. The barcode scanner is used for all items, if some restricted products are scanned, the till won't let you go through to payment before the supermarket attendant comes over and approves the transaction.
Re: We have those already in the US (Score:2)
...we can be trusted not to steal stuff in situations like that.
Yes, you are undoubtedly all well-behaved little serfs; centuries of the feudal elites' culling have effectively seen to that...
Yeah, but you should see them in the US (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
Sssssh,
Didn't you get the memo? It's time again to be divisive and not tolerate and make fun of presidents. We did have eight years of silence, but that's almost over now.
Re: (Score:2)
Which eight years was that, in which people didn't criticize the President? I'm pretty sure it hasn't been in my lifetime?
Or are you so biased or blind that the accusations leveled against Obama, including the ACA, foreign policy, etc., didn't register?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Anyone who criticized Bush II was called unpatriotic. I got called a "black propagandist" for disagreeing with the Bush-accepted interpretations of UN Security Council resolutions. In some respects, it's the coolest thing anyone's ever called me, but I digress.
However, I saw plenty of criticism of Obama, regardless of what the insult du jour for dissenters was. Heck, I criticized the guy myself sometimes.
Re: We have those already in the US (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, because Europeans are inherently all honest and Americans are all t'ieves aren't we?
Self-service checkouts turn honest shoppers into thieves, warn criminologists [telegraph.co.uk]
The study involved data from nearly 12 million shopping trips from four major British retailers as well others in the US, Belgium and Holland between 2013 and 2015
The researchers found that introducing self-checkouts raised the rate of loss by 122 per cent to an average of 3.9 per cent of turnover.
It is also difficult for retailers to identify whether a customer wilfully took items without scanning or were simply absentminded.
I'm in the US and I must plead guilty to being absentminded and "stealing" a loaf of bread once. It was very crowded and I just wanted to get the hell out of there. After I exited the store I noticed it sitting there in the lower basket of my cart (not scanned or paid for). I briefly thought about going back inside and paying for it, but then I thought of the crowds and the time it would take.
I figured I could just make it right the next time I shopped there. I never did.
I've also seen, but never taken, the opportunity to mis-enter the codes for my produce. Am I buying the expensive apples or the cheap ones? Hmmm....I could easily claim it was an honest mistake.
I don't do that because the risk is not worth the few pennies I might save. I also consider myself honest, but I guess I'm not that honest since I never made good on that loaf of bread.
And they don't always watch given that I sometimes have to track down an employee when the self-checkout thinks there's a problem. Usually they just clear the register without checking to make sure I didn't cheat.
I believe that Honesty through paranoia [youtube.com] is a real thing. Of course sometimes they really are watching. You can never know for sure unless you try, right?
Of course that's not going to stop everyone. Even before self-checkout some people would switch price tags, barcodes or just stuff more expensive merchandise into cheaper packaging. And then there's what's called "sweethearting" where the cashier just cooperates with the thief and doesn't ring certain things up properly if at all.
Don't kid yourself. Shoplifting and other forms of theft are a real problem all over the world. There are people who actually make a living at it.
Re: (Score:3)
Companies adopt self-checkout because the money they save on employee wages far outweighs the money that they lose on additional theft.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, exactly. Also, most shrinkage in retail is caused by employee theft [forbes.com]. So if anything, self-checkout helps avoid that part altogether :D
RFID countermeausures (Score:2)
Tag all the itmes (Score:2)
The simple (TM) solution is to tag all products on display, then bill the customer for whatever he takes out of the store. The amount is deducted from a pre-registered credit or debit payment account. An alternative is to have a display terminal near the exit that will alert the customer on the items he is about to bring out, absent-mindedly or not. The customer then has the chance to return any items taken by mistake (he will still not be liable for shoplifting since he's still inside the store) or to ca
Re: (Score:2)
Currently, with a checkout station, I've got a list of items to be purchased, and I can examine the pricing as it goes on. At the end, there's a total price that I explicitly pay. If there's a problem, I can bring it up on the spot, and, if it isn't resolved on the spot, I can simply refuse to purchase the item involved.
With any sort of out-the-door scan, if the store screws up in any way, it's going to be difficult to challenge. It may be difficult to detect. If there's a listed sale that's not in t
Re: We have those already in the US. Other places (Score:1)
And some who die from it!
Shoplifter/thief in watch store in Africa switched watches from cheap to expensive and left store (paid for cheap one) assistent saw it , chased with a meat cleaver, cut of parts of thief. I watched. Took note, and always in the open market thereafter paid openly with no hidden discount.
Re: (Score:2)
It's hard to say, sometimes having staff is good, sometimes not.
Web shopping used to be good because there were no sales staff pressuring or trying to mislead you. Then they figured out how to do that online too.
On the one hand I hate car dealers, but on the other hand I can always get a pretty hefty discount from them unlike Tesla who just have a single online price and you take it or leave it.
Japanese shops have lots of staff on the checkouts, sometimes two to a customer (one to pack, one to scan and hand
hotel mini bar like where if you bump something (Score:2)
hotel mini bar like where if you bump something you are billed?
and one person at a time?
Re: (Score:2)
I know, I know: "this is slashdot, we don't need no stinking articles."
Irony? (Score:1)
Is it ironic or telling that a story about a business location that allows you to take content without stopping at a register is behind a paywall?
Lovely but. (Score:2)
So I'm going to be a naysayer here (and yes I watched the video)
1. How do you control age restricted materials?
2. How do you control for multiple people co-ordinating to select a complete set of goods?
3. How are they going to use the huge amount of personal information they will collect on what you buy?
4. You can't pay with cash.
5. You have to have a smart phone plus the Amazon App. So it verges on "company store" mentality and all the negative connotations of "company towns"
6. You can't come in and browse
Re: (Score:1)
1) not sell them
2) don't know what you mean
3) the same way as on there website
4) I think that's part of the point, it's hardly a hurdle for uber
5) yes, and 100 years ago those connotations may have been in the collective consciousness in a real way
6) haven't watched the video, but that seems like a bad idea on their part
7) by not letting you purchase and having a greeter/security stop you.
Some of these will clearly be negatives, but they're betting on convenience and price being a good trade off. They don't
Re: (Score:2)
You need to watch the video. The store works by scanning a QR code on your phone in order to let you through a turnstile. That means that there is one person per phone in the store. But in reply to your reply.
1. They show alcohol being sold.
2. A group of people can't enter and shop as one unit. Imagine what that means for families.
3. There is shitload more surveillance going on in this store compared to a website. Stuff gets added/emoved from your "cart" as it is picked up/placed back on the shelves.
4.
Re: (Score:1)
OK, thanks.
1) Clearly this won't work overall (for example the under 21 issue), but that doesn't mean they won't modify it for general public. Unless the state and local laws allow them to treat a pre age verified amazon account as enough proof of age
2) Does Amazon have family accounts? That should handle the family situation for 12+, and if they don't, they probably should
3) Is it really gathering much more than the site? Amazon makes suggestions not just on what I've purchased, but what I've looked at.
4)
Re: (Score:2)
"1) Clearly this won't work overall (for example the under 21 issue), but that doesn't mean they won't modify it for general public. Unless the state and local laws allow them to treat a pre age verified amazon account as enough proof of age"
any smart system would have a flag for "Requires Employee Verification" since i know for a fact that in NC|USA the ALE folks try to trap stores.
Fun Factoid: In North Carolina if you have an out of state ID card it is not valid for Alcohol/Cigarettes
Valid includes: US DL
Re: (Score:1)
In my state many bars have decided a passport card doesn't count. It's caused me trouble, because I often go out with a throw away credit card and my passport card, as there's nothing to really lose then.
Re: (Score:3)
So I'm going to be a naysayer here (and yes I watched the video)
1. How do you control age restricted materials?
By not selling them. Obviously a better choice is for everyone to stop policing their neighbors' lives, but...
2. How do you control for multiple people co-ordinating to select a complete set of goods?
By not opening the stores in high crime neighborhoods. But mostly by not worrying about it. You know who is in the store and presumably you have cameras.
3. How are they going to use the huge amount of personal information they will collect on what you buy?
Add it to the info Amazon already has on what you buy from Amazon.
4. You can't pay with cash.
Shut down Internet commerce. You can't (generally) buy things online with cash.
5. You have to have a smart phone plus the Amazon App. So it verges on "company store" mentality and all the negative connotations of "company towns"
Apparently you don't know what company stores and company towns are. Hint: it's not when there are
Re: (Score:1)
1) As already pointed out, "don't sell them" (this is a C-Store, not a Wal-Mart).
2) How would this activity be impacted in any way at all?
3) I'd imagine you can read about it in the TOS, like 99.999% of other services that collect personal data on you.
4) Sounds like you aren't the target demographic.
5) This is a joke, right? Having to be a part of a club to get inside a store? What is Costco, wh
Re: (Score:2)
Good questions and I'll add to them..
How do they apply coupons?
How does the store manage returns?
What happens when a customer puts an item back on the shelf in the wrong place?
What digital security measures are they taking? (not just on the database side, but criminals with RFID scanners would surely target a place like this)
I'm not against the idea, but I'm skeptical.
Re: (Score:2)
Good questions and I'll add to them..
How do they apply coupons?
By not taking coupons.
How does the store manage returns?
What happens when a customer puts an item back on the shelf in the wrong place?
Have guys working there to stock shelves and handle weird exception conditions.
What digital security measures are they taking? (not just on the database side, but criminals with RFID scanners would surely target a place like this)
Dealing with elaborate theft schemes isn't the main thing that stores worry about. Maybe the answer is: "buy theft insurance".
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
on #1 local state laws may force an ID check / say manual lane only
Retail and Driving (Score:4, Insightful)
The most common jobs for Females in the US is Retail Cashier. The most common jobs for Males in the US is driver. Amazon is coming out with a store which doesnt need cashiers and Google is coming out with a truck which doesnt need drivers.
Just what are people with only high school supposed to do? This is not Europe where govt pays for you to go to college. Many poor families cannot afford college and need jobs which can be done with a high school education.
If this goes on the govt. will have to fund college including a living stipend while people made redundant go back to college to learn skills for the new economy.
Re: (Score:2)
>Just what are people with only high school supposed to do?
In the words of one of the most (in)famous capitalists:
"I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the [welfare] establishments I have mentioned: they cost enough: and those who are badly off must go there.''
"Many can't go there; and many would rather die.''
"If they would rather die,'' said Scrooge, ``they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."
Re: (Score:2)
Just where do you think Zombies come from?
Re:Retail and Driving (Score:5, Funny)
Well.... when two zombies love each other very much....
Re: (Score:2)
Wish I had mod points.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The issue with this is that in previous years Capitalists had a motive in training people for the new jobs. Now however there are 3rd world nations like India and China training people in colleges for free. It is much easier to go setup a factory in India and China because you have already trained college labor - labor for example who can supervise and fix robots. You can pay much lesser than in the US because these fresh robot techs have no student loans neither are they living in a high cost economy.
This
We need more tech and trade schools like germany! (Score:2)
We need more tech and trade schools like Germany! and they have good unions there as well.
Re: (Score:2)
yes but they need not be 2-4-6+ years long. also hands on is an much better fit then 4+ years of Prue class room for people who have a hard time in school / for jobs / rolls where you really don't learn that well by cramming for tests.
Re: (Score:2)
>This is not Europe where govt pays for you to go to college
Doesn't matter because it's a broken assumption to think that college is for everyone.
That's not the entire answer, but it's a huge part of it. Even if every unemployed person without a college degree were willing and able to get one, that would put downward pressure on salaries for the people they're now competing with.
Re: (Score:2)
If you think college is not for everyone and I think their are some skills needed by everyone in todays economy which are only taught at the college level then the obvious solution is to update K-12 schooling to include those skills. Skills like being able to do some programming. Understanding how public media/advertisement works to influence you. Knowing how markets/economies work so that you can save and invest efficiently. If necessary High School could be increased by 2 more years and adulthood could be
Re: (Score:2)
and cut down college to 2 years for most BA / BS. And have a GED like test to get one as well.
With the new extended HS taking place of the old AA / AS.
Re: (Score:2)
I would suggest
Lower-Primary - Start as Age 4 - Pre-K, K,Grade 1, Grade 2
Upper-Primary - Start at Age 8 - Grade 3,4,5,6
Lower Secondary School - Start at Age 12 - Grade 7,8,9,10 +Point All the human Biology stuff can be left till Grade 7 instead of introducing in Grade 6.
Upper Secondary School/Vocational School - Start at Age 16 - Grade 11,12,13,14. 50% of the time has to be in internships/apprenticeships/AP classes in High School. 50% in life skills + Point Students are old enough legally to drive and work
Re: (Score:3)
Just what are people with only high school supposed to do?
Be unemployed, getting angrier and angrier. And if history is any indication, that always ends well.
Re: (Score:3)
Just what are people with only high school supposed to do? This is not Europe where govt pays for you to go to college. Many poor families cannot afford college and need jobs which can be done with a high school education.
Votechs. The US needs to go to a more European model where students pick either a college track or a technical skills track. Maybe slightly modify it to where they split the last 2 years of high school, and make the first 2 years a much more general education, ie liberal arts, math, and life skills like basic accounting etc. After the second year if you want to go the college track you can take more advanced sciences, math, literature, etc; if you want the technical track you can start taking classes spe
maybe some kind of badge systems to fill the gaps (Score:2)
maybe some kind of badge systems to fill the gaps.
Right the boot camps and certs really don't add up to any thing.
The College accreditation system can use some change. The tech/trade schools have accreditation that is more open to faster changes but did not crack down as much as they should of.
The non tech/trade schools have accreditation that makes it hard to do fast updates to class content and does not crack down on the transfer mess and joke classes for student athletes. Minor leagues for football and b
Re: (Score:2)
Here in Minneapolis, the public school system does have distinct high school programs, depending on what you want to do. My son was in a college-track one, which suited him well. Some programs are designed for people to get jobs after they graduate, without a vo-tech or community college. As far as I can tell, it seems to work.
However, as long as there are jobs where a college degree is a legitimate plus, you haven't solved the problem of rising college costs.
an unlimited student loans get's you to college (Score:2)
an unlimited student loans get's you to college and it's very easy to get one.
Re: (Score:2)
There are already many people indebted with college debt. If College was a choice then debt makes sense. But if college is no longer a choice and is mandatory to survie then it makes sense for society to pay for it..
Re: (Score:1)
This is skirting the real issue... Why doesn't someone have better skills than flipping burgers or ringing out customers after 12 years of public education?
We have lost the value associated with vo-tech education. We are graduating people who can't do simple tax forms or balance a check book. We're letting people loose on society that can't follow the instructions on a box of laundry detergent...
Public education has fallen apart and, no, funding isn't an issue. We have tons of funding. We also have a social
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure what the suggestion here is.
Are we trying to say we should halt innovation because little Johnny can't get his ass through a 2 year degree program that costs next to nothing? There's tons of financial support for Community Colleges, lack of money isn't a valid excuse.
Re: (Score:2)
Nope. Government-funded college is socialism--the worst evil of all. More US citizens will simply have to cope with poverty, which, though undesirable, is at least ideologically pure. Maybe buy a lottery ticket and dream big!
Finally - IBM suggested this a decade+ ago (Score:2)
Even cashiers are being automated. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
At one time Walmart pushed vendors to put RFID in all items. They hoped to remove checkout lines - fill your basket and walk out the door.
Maybe technology has moved that magic step forward. Plus the world is **ready** for this - we've all been using self-checkout stations for awhile now --- and many of us are still waiting in the Thanksgiving lines at Walmart.
Prime is working for our family. Beyond "Top Gear Two" (TGT :-) The Grand T
Seattle has a huge homeless population (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
This is tied to your Amazon (probably Prime) account (you can't get in otherwise). If you are a bad customer,we lock you out of your account.
And then you die a slow, unpleasant death. You have no access to bulk toothpaste and clever little bits of Chinese electronics. Not to mention movies and books that no one has ever heard of (for good reason). Or whatever else we tacked onto the Prime subscription last week (I keep forgetting just what it was).
-- All the best, Jeff.
Re: (Score:2)
Cant they just walk in the exit door. If they are planning to break the law with shoplifting I am pretty sure they are not bothered about not going through turnstiles
Re: (Score:2)
I am sure that an algorithm will impartially reject potential customers based on impartial criteria....
Theft (Score:2)
"Unknown item in bagging area" (Score:2)
How would this system resolve the annoyances of existing self-checkout? What happens if your cart includes a bottle of wine or a head of lettuce? Could it sanely handle very light items or large and heavy items?
If two people are standing next to each other (Score:1)
Especially convenient (Score:1)
Priceing errors? (Score:2)
What happens when the bill is higher then the posted price do you need go through a big refund paperwork chain? vs just telling the cashier that wrong price came up. Also in laws say they must give you the lower posted price and they can't say the price went up and we do not up date the posted price till end of the day but our on line rules say we can up the price at check out.