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Amazon's Checkout-Free Stores Are Coming to Three More Cities (reuters.com)

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the surveillance-as-a-service dept.

Reuters reports: Amazon said on Friday it plans to open its checkout-free 'Amazon Go' grocery store in New York, expanding beyond Seattle where it is headquartered. The Amazon Go store, which has no cashiers and allows shoppers to buy things with the help of a smartphone app, is widely seen as a concept that can alter brick-and-mortar retail... Customers have to scan a smartphone app to enter the store. Once inside, cameras and sensors track what they pick up from the shelves and what they put back. Amazon then bills shoppers' credit cards on file after they leave.
CNET adds: The expansion comes after two Amazon Go stores opened in Seattle. The first one debuted in January 2018 and the second opened last month... Amazon confirmed in May that it'll open Amazon Go stores in San Francisco and Chicago, but it didn't say when.

95 comments

  1. "Checkout-Free" by MonopolyKiller · · Score: 1

    Does this mean the products inside the store free if you don't have to check out?

    1. Re:"Checkout-Free" by mark-t · · Score: 1

      It's my understanding that you are simply charged for whatever you leave the store with, so that there's no actual checkout process.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
    2. Re: "Checkout-Free" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It was easy... download the store app, go in the store, grab some shit and leave.

      It all looked pretty good, but to be honest, I wasnâ(TM)t particularly hungry when I was there, so I left empty handed.

  2. Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    Amazon's boss earns 23.3K in nine seconds. That's more than what half of his employees earn /per year/.

    1. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 0

      Top athletes and entertainers also make insane amounts. And somehow we’re all ok with that.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    2. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And how many of those employees are on SNAP? Or any other kind of assistance?

      I believe Bernie is on to something with his idea[1] to end this corporate welfare and charge these companies for what it's costing the rest of us to support them.

      [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2018/09/05/bernie-sanders-introduces-stop-bezos-act-senate/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.2185e0467a80

    3. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's a really bad metric for evaluating anything.

      Would you be happier with Amazon if they fired all their low wage employees? That would fix your complaint.

    4. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 0

      You realize that any efforts which make labor more expensive drive exactly this kind of automation. Eventually Amazon won't have an employees on SNAP because it won't employ anyone to do minimum wage labor. Is Bernie going to start taxing them for all of the people that they don't employee next?

      You also make the assumption that it's the corporations that cost us something to support these people. When these people don't have a job at all (and can't get any because you've made it more expensive to employee them than their labor is worth) it's going to cost the rest of us a lot more to support them.

    5. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by rmdingler · · Score: 1

      Conversely, this methodology would actually encourage Amazon (and others) to expand their robotic workforce so "what it's costing the rest of us" would increase... unless you have reason to believe Amazon is holding these workers back from getting better paying jobs elsewhere?

      Looking at it another way, opponents of welfare-type benefits have lobbied variously for implementing drug-testing and community service work to receive these government pittances some call "handouts". Amazon and Walmart, et al, accomplish these two goals, and keep the cheap goods flowing for the nearly poor (middle class).

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    6. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 2

      Driving the push to automation is not a bug, it's a feature. It's always framed as if higher wages will get rid of jobs, instead of the reality, which is that low wages are holding back technological progress.

      Now, the economics of how to transition away from human labor is a bit more complicated, although it mostly just means taxing the rich so they aren't eaten by the jobless peasants.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    7. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      > Top athletes and entertainers also make insane amounts. And somehow weâ(TM)re all ok with that.

      I'm OK with someone making money. But not at the cost of others who barely earn their lives. Or, as is the case with Amazon, who depend on state help *on top* of having to work full-time. That's when it becomes obscene.

      I, for one aren't (and won't be, ever) their customer.

    8. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I didn't realize that athletes and entertainers obtained their wealth by employing an army of laborers at third world wages. Damn!

    9. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are reading too much Ayn Rand. Don't do it, it messes with your brain.

    10. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You also make the assumption that it's the corporations that cost us something to support these people. When these people don't have a job at all (and can't get any because you've made it more expensive to employee them than their labor is worth) it's going to cost the rest of us a lot more to support them.

      I make no such assumption, thank you very much.

      You make the assumption that there's nothing wrong with a company paying less than living wages to the bottom earners while at the same time paying absurdly high wages to the top four or five. Now I have no problem with the owner and founder being well compensated. He or she took the risk, and did the work. But we left the feudal system behind. There is no moral justification for such a disparity. Yes, we love Capitalism, but this is Capitalism at its worst. Or maybe you really do want to live in a real life Game of Thrones. (I wonder how long you would last.)

      And if Amazon doesn't hire them, well, we're all paying into Social Security and have Welfare for that. But that's orthogonal to the problem of Amazon not paying its current employees a living wage.

    11. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      This has nothing to do with Rand or her political theories, and I even advocate for a UBI which should tell you how far off the mark you are. It is simple logic and basic economics. When prices go up, people look for less expensive alternatives. Why do you think Amazon (or Walmart) have so many customers to begin with?

      The other is that is costs a certain amount of money for a person to live, even at a subsistence level. If the government (that is our tax dollars) have to pay this amount, will it be more or less if the person has some income of their own? This should be simple math.

    12. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Is Bernie going to start taxing them for all of the people that they don't employee next?

      Don't be absurd. Bernie has never suggested any such thing, and and you're just making shit up to scare people.

      I'll let you decide which of the 15 debating flaws that's a match for.
      Go back under your bridge, Dmitri. We found the troll.

    13. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      I cannot see how low wages holds technology back. Low wages are a consequence of labor that is not valuable. In one hundred years after all of the technological advances there will still be low wage jobs. Not all people are equally skilled and not all jobs are equally valued.

      The difference is that technological progress improves productivity and reduces costs. A low wage job in the future may be able to afford a trip to the moon whereas now even most high wage jobs could not imagine doing this.

    14. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So don't complain about how much he makes but about how he makes it

    15. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by DogDude · · Score: 2

      And somehow we’re all ok with that.

      "We" who? Speak for yourself. I don't think it's a sign of a healthy society (and I don't spend money on sports or entertainers).

      And even so, what's your point? Something is bad, so something else bad is OK? C'mon, dude.

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
    16. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Let's put it this way, during his entire life MJ earned 1.2 billion dollars. He also didn't control 50% of all new music.
      Bezos making money isn't the issue, his company controlling half of all online transactions, and his net worth reaching the point of the GDP of a small country in the future (he's worth $160 billion, makes $11,000,000 an hour)– at what point is having that power incompatible with democracy?

    17. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by drinkypoo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I cannot see how low wages holds technology back.

      As long as it's cheaper to hire a human than to develop technology to automate their job, the job doesn't get automated. Thus, useful progress is retarded by making it legal to pay starvation wages.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    18. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      It's simple. By trying to keep the price of human labor low, you discourage proper investment in automation. Why bother automating while its still cheaper to just throw cheap labor at your problems?

      The same rationalization is used by opponents of wage increases, saying that increasing wages will lead to jobs being replaced by robots. But works sucks, and jobs that can be replaced by robots should be replaced by robots.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    19. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      That's covered by the whole "boss" thing.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    20. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by rmdingler · · Score: 1

      Cheap labor may not vote early and often, but so far, they're infinitely more important at the ballot box than their robotic replacements.

      The Magnus Robot Fighter, human/robot confrontation of the future might more likely develop from displaced lower class workers than an AI attempt at Overlord-ship.

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    21. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by ebyrob · · Score: 1

      Not to disagree here, but something is important not to forget:

      labor that is not valuable

      If it wasn't valuable, it wouldn't be paid for at all. Humans can do things and are still useful, even when under educated or untrained.

      In the context of some people who make $25,000 per year vs some people who make $100,000 per year, it appears to make sense that the different labor involved could have different levels of value. However, when you then compare with someone making $155k per minute we're talking about societal gaming and barriers to entry not overall societal benefit.

      For one thing, compare Jeff Bezo's contribution to society with Stephen Hawking or Albert Einstein. Or even just Vint Cerf or Tim Berners-Lee.

      Also, at the "nearly useless" value of $35,000 / year in wages, construction workers build the cities we live in and the factories which enrich CEOs.

      Face it. The economy is a game and some people are very very good at playing that game.

    22. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 2

      So what? They have hundreds of thousands or millions of people that want to pay money to see them perform. Would you rather a record company or sports team owner get all of that money instead?

      Why should I disparage someone who earns millions of dollars when I haven't had to pay them any of it unless I wanted to. It doesn't cost me anything if Taylor Swift or LeBron James are able to sell their time and talents for millions of dollars and I'm not about to start telling other people what they're allowed to spend their own money on either.

    23. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uhh, but this store has NO EMPLOYEES. So now I guess you have to cry about how he's takin' yur jerbs!

    24. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 3, Informative

      So if we increased the minimum wage to $50 an hour, everything would be great all of a sudden. Wouldn't $100 an hour be better still then? I think the logic breaks down and it's easy to see why.

      It also doesn't make much sense when looking at history. There were no minimum wage laws and people often were paid starvation wages if they were paid at all. And yet useful progress occurred nonetheless. People are always going to try to find a cheaper way of doing something as long as there's a potential for increased profit that they can realize as a result of doing so. While there are some that don't even need that and are quite happy to work away at some problem for its own sake, they are rare.

      Perhaps what you're thinking of is that there's less pressure to find a less expensive alternative when the cost of some aspect of production is low relative to the other components and that's certainly true, but the logic still does not hold. One could argue that paying starvation wages to the low skill labor leaves more money available to invest into research and development. That naturally implies that there will be higher wages for researchers if there is more demand for that kind of labor, but it does nothing for the kind of low skill employees whose plight the original poster was bemoaning.

      I suppose you can try to play economic god and demand that certain jobs pay more in order to try to drive technological advancement in those areas, but history has shown that the people who try to run planned economies often make an utter mess of things.

    25. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      Why bother automating while its still cheaper to just throw cheap labor at your problems?

      If labor is inexpensive relative to other costs, investments will be made to find ways to reduce those other costs first. After this has been done, labor will be relatively more expensive. At a certain point, it may become the most expensive and then investments will be made in order to reduce labor costs. Technological innovation is going to occur in some area regardless of labor costs and it's likely that driving down the cost of raw material inputs requires automation in a different sector. The labor that is most easy to automate, will generally get replaced before the labor which is more difficult to replace even if you pay both of those people the same wage.

      Having cheap labor means that you have more money to throw at your other problems. Couldn't one then argue that by paying your low skill labor the least amount possible means that you have more money to spend on research and development or investing in other areas to improve productivity? I don't believe that low wages have any (or if it does, then it's incredibly small compared to other factors) affect on the rate of automation and technological advancement in the overall scheme of things. Advancement and automation are going to occur somewhere and in a free market, it will tend to occur in the areas where it produces the largest increases in value. People will seek to automate where replacing a minimum wage human laborer results in a cost savings of say $5 and hour over where it only results in a savings of $1 an hour.

    26. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by LordWabbit2 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Why bother automating while its still cheaper to just throw cheap labor at your problems?

      When the problem is not wages, but people themselves, then their jobs are going to get automated.
      People committing suicide at Fox-con was really bad publicity for them.
      People getting sick, HR issues, theft, strikes, holidays, work hours, labor laws etc. etc. etc.
      Now that the cost of automation has come down a LOT, and it's a lot more capable you are going to get jobs automated.

      I still remember the look on a woman's face when she realized that the logistics system we were rewriting would automate away her daily job. She was old and sickly, for her to try and get another job was going to be a problem for her. I mean, we do this all the time, but actually sitting in front of her and seeing that look on her face... not something I enjoyed, and since we were actually work friends it was even harder.

      That same woman who I was coding out of a job used to get an excel spreadsheet that had each line of data split over two lines in excel (a COBOL thing) it would take her two days to manually remove the page break headers and footers, take the one line and add it to the end of the other so that it could be sorted properly. She used to take it home in the evenings and work on it as well, because it was a big ass report. I wrote a script for her in VBA which took 2 minutes to run and did it all for her. Two days work automated into two minutes, but that she was grateful for, because I automated a lot of tedium from her monthly work duties. But automating her job out of existence, not so much. I also think she never told anyone about the script, I didn't think about it at the time either, it was a personal favor. So I think she had two "days off" every month. Ironically she never lost her job when the system went live, she died from cancer about a year before, as sad as that was I think I would have had a harder time knowing I wrote a program that forced an old lady to live on the streets. I know, we programmers are doing that all the time, but actually knowing the person I was replacing with code... I will never forget that look on her face.

      --
      There are three kinds of falsehood: the first is a 'fib,' the second is a downright lie, and the third is statistics.
    27. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Top athletes and entertainers don't have a business model of underpaying huge amounts of people while simultaneously trying to eliminate their jobs either. Don't shop at Amazon stores.

    28. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "(and I don't spend money on sports or entertainers)."

      Actually, you probably do. You might not do it directly, which is what I think you were saying, but their cost is factored into the price of many products under the marketing expense category.

    29. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure work sucks. You know what else sucks? Not having money to pay for the necessities of life.

      Solve that problem and I'm all about robots. Until then, robots need to be severely regulated, banned, whatever is necessary.

      "But that's never worked before, go ask buggy whip makers" (or some other stupid garbage people like to trot out and think they're so smart). Yeah, to an extent, but in the past what happened was we had labor saving machines that assisted workers in being more productive. This led to more jobs being created elsewhere and more support jobs that go with them. You have a busy factory? Those people have to eat lunch somewhere, need stuff around the house fixed, need a bar to hang out at after work, etc. That all creates jobs too. Automation was actually quite good for everybody in those days. So, geniuses who are thinking this is all fine, what jobs are being created in the wake of all this job destruction this time around? Yeah, I thought so.

    30. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      And yet useful progress occurred nonetheless.

      Which has never, ever been part of any argument. The question is not whether or not progress occurs, but the rate at which it occurs.

      One could argue that paying starvation wages to the low skill labor leaves more money available to invest into research and development.

      One would be ignoring how sensible investment works. Why would invest high-cost labor to reduce a minor part of costs? And this is especially true if the CxO structure is oriented around short-term gains.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    31. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      I cannot see how low wages holds technology back.

      As long as it's cheaper to hire a human than to develop technology to automate their job, the job doesn't get automated. Thus, useful progress is retarded by making it legal to pay starvation wages.

      So if we increased the minimum wage to $50 an hour, everything would be great all of a sudden. Wouldn't $100 an hour be better still then? I think the logic breaks down and it's easy to see why.

      Yes, yes it is. And the reason why is your logically fallacious ridiculous example. I said that starvation wages were the problem; you responded by asking what would happen if we increased wages to CEO levels. That makes you the reason.

      It also doesn't make much sense when looking at history. There were no minimum wage laws and people often were paid starvation wages if they were paid at all. And yet useful progress occurred nonetheless.

      This time your logical fallacy is moving the goalposts. The issue being addressed is whether low wages retard progress, not halt it completely.

      Perhaps what you're thinking of is that there's less pressure to find a less expensive alternative when the cost of some aspect of production is low relative to the other components and that's certainly true,

      Yes, that's what I said. That you had trouble comprehending it is your failure, not mine.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    32. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Networth != Income

    33. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      Actually, you probably do. You might not do it directly, which is what I think you were saying, but their cost is factored into the price of many products under the marketing expense category.

      If I see sports bullshit on a product, as in "official sponsor of" then I make an effort to find an alternative product. That goes double for the Olympics. I am actually willing to pay more in order to not sponsor professional sports.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    34. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      People committing suicide at Fox-con was really bad publicity for them.

      But did they lose any business because of it? They just put up some nets and the story went away.

      The suicide story was fake news anyway. Foxconn employs 800,000 people, so there are going to be some suicides in a population that large. Foxconn's suicide rate is, and has always been, below what demographics would predict.

      Interesting factoid: China is the only country in the world where the female suicide rate exceeds the male rate.

    35. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      The question is not whether or not progress occurs, but the rate at which it occurs.

      If you think that low wages are holding back progress, then raising them should drive progress. Set the minimum wage at $50 and we should progress much faster. Hike it up again to $100 and even more progress, right? That's essentially what you're proposing. Are you proposing this across the board or just singling out Amazon workers because that's where you want to drive progress?

      What you're failing to consider is that there isn't just one form of low wage labor. There are hundreds if not thousands of different jobs that pay minimum wage. The ones that get replaced first are where the greatest differential lies between the cost of labor and the savings due to automation.

      Why would invest high-cost labor to reduce a minor part of costs?

      This assumes that the high-cost labor is focused on reducing the cost of low-cost labor, which isn't necessarily true. Instead it would be invested in reducing whatever had the largest differential between current cost and potential savings. Perhaps that means developing a new material that can used to build a product which costs considerably less, engineering the product to be more reliable so that there are fewer returns of defective units, finding a less expensive way of transporting the products to the consumers, or any number of other areas that might reduce production costs. No company will page more than they have to for low skill labor if there's a pool of willing replacements available, which is why there are a lot of minimum wage jobs. Only when there is a shortage of available labor will companies actually raise wages. However, that just makes the cost of labor a relatively more expensive part of production.

      And this is especially true if the CxO structure is oriented around short-term gains.

      Which works in the short term, but the more money that a company snatches up in profit, just means the larger opportunity for someone else to undercut them, especially if that company has been neglecting advances and insists on doing things the same old way. Look at retail, which is a perfect example. One hundred years ago Sears Roebuck was quickly replacing companies doing things the old way, and now they're gone. Walmart came in and ate their lunch, and now Amazon is quickly becoming the dominant player. The business of selling goods to consumers has carried on, but the individual companies that were doing it have come and gone, in part because some executive was worried about the next quarter instead of the next two decades. Consumers are not worse off for the folly of executives as long as it's possible for some other company to form and attract their business.

    36. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      That's ridiculous thinking. We should alter economics to match technological changes, not the other way around. We don't need to work nearly as much. We do need to make sure that people can meet their basic needs. UBI is more sane than banning robots.

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    37. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They don't? Kaepernick is getting millions from Nike who make products with child labor in south east Asian sweatshops.

    38. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The stores do have employees, just fewer than similar stores run by other companies. Restocking is done by humans while the store is closed.

    39. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      If you think that low wages are holding back progress, then raising them should drive progress. Set the minimum wage at $50 and we should progress much faster. Hike it up again to $100 and even more progress, right? That's essentially what you're proposing. Are you proposing this across the board or just singling out Amazon workers because that's where you want to drive progress?

      You are strawmanning like someone who's never heard of the concept of diminishing returns. Yes, bigger increases in wages will cause more pressure, but such massive increases will cause other problems on a bigger scale.

      What you're failing to consider is that there isn't just one form of low wage labor. There are hundreds if not thousands of different jobs that pay minimum wage. The ones that get replaced first are where the greatest differential lies between the cost of labor and the savings due to automation.

      Failed to consider? That's practically my thesis statement.

      This assumes that the high-cost labor is focused on reducing the cost of low-cost labor, which isn't necessarily true.

      That's a pretty reasonable assumption, given that your hypothetical has roughly the same pressure regardless of wages. Your point would be more relevant if these businesses were operating with virtually no profits, but there is more than enough money available for the big boys to do that kind of research either way.

      Only when there is a shortage of available labor will companies actually raise wages. However, that just makes the cost of labor a relatively more expensive part of production.

      Companies will raise wages if they have to raise wages. The underlying problem here is that wages have been kept stagnant in order to serve our oligarchs, and because of that, investment in automation has been disincentivized. That doesn't mean that there are no investments.

      --
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    40. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Have you ever been to a country with low wages (compared to the United States)? Visiting China, it's astonishing how much is done by humans that would be done by machines in the US. I hear it's even more extreme in India.

      If there's a machine that can do the job of a human, that machine has some cost and lifetime (or, cost to maintain it). A business will only buy the machine instead of hiring a human if the cost of the machine is lower than the cost of the human (the machine will have pros and cons vs. the human so it's not an exact comparison). Therefore, the more expensive humans are the more jobs will tilt in favor of machines instead of humans doing them. (Naturally, this doesn't necessarily mean fewer humans employed: the improved productivity may mean the company may just be doing more and needs more humans to do other tasks.)

      You seem to be harping on the point that such machines aren't going to magically appear as soon as they would be cheaper than humans if they existed. Which is true and why increasing the minimum wage to $infinity/hr today won't mean Strong AI will be invented tomorrow. But if wages are too low, then there's no market for the machines, so there will be minimal investment toward developing them: the price signal on the price of labor is wrong (i.e. fails to pay a living wage), so the economy is undervaluing the development of better machines.

      Of course, with my comment about China and India above, I've pointed out that wage differences mean that in one locality it may make sense to do the R&D even if it doesn't make sense in another locality, and the technology could theoretically be transferred, complicating the model.

    41. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If Amazon paid low wages to illegal Mexicans instead of American citizens the Democrats would be lining up to give Bezos an award. He should just switch to using undocumented labor and the Democrats will have to fall back. Spare me the concern theater.

    42. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They do. How much do you think the apparel factories pay their factory employees? How much do the parking attendants and concessions workers earn?

    43. Re:Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bullshit. I know about half a dozen people who work for Amazon. And while it's not Google of Facebook money; they're paid competitively for their positions; and have mostly good things to say about the company. The bennies are good. And the stock grants are nothing to sneeze at either. In fact, once I'm fully vested at my current company, there's a Sr. Cloud TAM position they've been trying to recruit me for that I just might take.

    44. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by LordWabbit2 · · Score: 1

      so there are going to be some suicides in a population that large

      Fair enough, but it was still bad publicity, even if it was statistically below average. If a robot dragged it's ass up the side of the building and jumped off it would... probably not make the news.

      Did they actually lose business? Not sure, but I am pretty sure their stock price would have been battered, I do know that they had to implement changes to their work environment and work policies. So if it's feasible to replace humans with lower cost (in the long run) machines then it would be silly not to do so. I suspect the slow(ish) adoption is not really a question of if it can be done, but more a question of if there are enough skilled people to do so in a timeous manner. For all we know Siemans etc. have a three year backlog of work scheduled. I am currently working in IoT - relatively new at it in fact - and the work backlog is humongous, and that is relatively simple compared to full automation, so I imagine it's pretty hard to currently find people who can actually do the work.

      Of course that will change, supply and demand and all that. When I first studied programming I got a job relatively easily (even as a junior) because programmers were hard to find. Ok, being in the biggest city of the country helped a lot, but about a decade later throwing a beer in a pub would hit 3 programmers. About another decade later and they got scarce again. I know a LOT of programmers who moved into business analysis etc. to get away from the coding. Sure they passed the tests, they made adequate programmers, but they hated the work. It takes a certain mindset to sit all day and build poetry in motion. Add to that the fact that you never actually stop studying as a programmer, if you do stop, well you will no longer be employable, it makes it a difficult long term career compared to most.

      The same will happen with automation engineers, there is a shortage now, but not for long. Supply and demand, the current skilled engineers will earn a premium salary, this will in turn make it enticing to get into that career path for people who are not really suited for that. If you think programmers are strange then working with a bunch of electrical engineers will seriously change that viewpoint.

      To a large degree programmers have to have at least some social skills. Going to meetings, meeting with clients, dealing with people to handle bug reports etc. etc. all depending on your work environment and your position in the company of course. Electrical engineers, yeah, not so much. At least not yet, but I have been working closely with electrical engineers for a while now, and they are an odd group of people, even by programmer standards. I get along well with them, but then I think I am considered odd in programming circles (which says a lot I suppose) but I do electrical engineering (and mechanical) as hobbies, so I understand their language (most days).

      Mass automation is coming, the technology is there, the price point to implement it has come down a lot, the problem is the amount of resources to implement it is lacking. It's pointless implementing mass automation if no company will sign a reasonable SLA for a reasonable price. For that you will still need people and skills, just less people and more skills.

      --
      There are three kinds of falsehood: the first is a 'fib,' the second is a downright lie, and the third is statistics.
    45. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ask the East India trade company

    46. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      Let me put it more explicitly. Outside of a few areas like doctors and developers, the wages of people who actually do direct labor has gone down relative to productivity, while profits were diverted to a small minority. Because that labor has been continually undervalued, the incentive structure has underestimated the value in labor-saving, and appropriate amounts of research and manhours have not been put into labor-saving efforts and automation. If we were to start to bring back a stronger correlation between labor productivity and compensation, it would incentivize much healthier levels of automation, which tend to be where the real growth happens.

      Cheap labor is an economic crutch. That's why, on top of the moral concerns, slavery and serfdom are not parts of good economic models.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    47. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So, I'd evaluate myself if I were you. You read as sociopath. Maybe you already know this about yourself. If not, research it. If so, disclose it when you sound off with your opinion. What do you have to lose?

    48. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Necessity is the mother of invention.

      In ancient Greece a man named Hero of Alexander invented the world's first steam engine. It was only a simple turbine, never fully developed. After all, who needs steam engines when cheap slaves are so abundant?

      Imagine where we'd be today if the industrial revolution happened a couple of thousand years earlier...

    49. Re: Don't buy at Amazon by lsatenstein · · Score: 1

      So if we increased the minimum wage to $50 an hour, everything would be great all of a sudden. Wouldn't $100 an hour be better still then? I think the logic breaks down and it's easy to see why.

      It also doesn't make much sense when looking at history. There were no minimum wage laws and people often were paid starvation wages if they were paid at all. And yet useful progress occurred nonetheless. People are always going to try to find a cheaper way of doing something as long as there's a potential for increased profit that they can realize as a result of doing so. While there are some that don't even need that and are quite happy to work away at some problem for its own sake, they are rare.

      Perhaps what you're thinking of is that there's less pressure to find a less expensive alternative when the cost of some aspect of production is low relative to the other components and that's certainly true, but the logic still does not hold. One could argue that paying starvation wages to the low skill labor leaves more money available to invest into research and development. That naturally implies that there will be higher wages for researchers if there is more demand for that kind of labor, but it does nothing for the kind of low skill employees whose plight the original poster was bemoaning.

        Please try living on minimum wage for a month. Can you survive?

      I suppose you can try to play economic god and demand that certain jobs pay more in order to try to drive technological advancement in those areas, but history has shown that the people who try to run planned economies often make an utter mess of things.

      --
      Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
  3. What else does the app do ? by Alain+Williams · · Score: 1

    other than allow you to buy stuff at one of these stores. Does is: track your location; upload your contacts; ... ie generally abuse your privacy ?

    1. Re:What else does the app do ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We already know the answer, don't we?

    2. Re: What else does the app do ? by Kristoph · · Score: 1

      On iOS it does not use your location and all and doesnâ(TM)t sync with any data on your device.

      In essence, it just generates a one time bar code for your amazon account and it notifies you of your purchases.

      Overall it works well although I found the products available in the store to be very limited.

    3. Re: What else does the app do ? by Kristoph · · Score: 1

      It does not, on iOS at least. It doesnâ(TM)t ask for your location or any device data.

    4. Re: What else does the app do ? by sglewis100 · · Score: 1

      Why would it need to track you from your phone? You walk in having authenticated as a specific Amazon user and then they track what you take, what you look at, etc. No need for your phone to transmit, youâ(TM)ve already told them who you are and they can transmit the data yourself.

    5. Re: What else does the app do ? by Kristoph · · Score: 1

      It does not transmit anything. The bar code is just to identify your account which is done when you enter.

    6. Re: What else does the app do ? by sglewis100 · · Score: 1

      Youâ(TM)re completely missing my point. I donâ(TM)t dispute that your phone sends nothing. Itâ(TM)s irrelevant. You are, of course, being tracked. Amazon can bill you because youâ(TM)re using the barcode to authenticate yourself as an Amazon user. From there, of course he cameras in the store are being used to track your purchases, but for sure your browsing mannerisms too. Thereâ(TM)s more tracking there then in any âregularâ(TM) store. Personally, Iâ(TM)m ok with that, same reason I swipe my discount card at the supermarket. But letâ(TM)s not insinuate you arenâ(TM)t being tracked.

  4. How are errors dealt with? by mark_reh · · Score: 3, Interesting

    If their system screws up and charges me for something I put back on the shelf how do we prove that I didn't take the item? How do they legally prove that I did take it?

    1. Re:How are errors dealt with? by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 1

      If the screwups are few enough, they will probably deal with them like they do with theft: ignore it. You can probably make a claim that you got overcharged and they will refund it without asking too many questions. Just make the process slightly cumbersome, and make some vague threats about banning you from the store after making too many false claims (by reviewing camera footage for instance) and they can probably afford to take you at your word when you make a claim, only doing occasional spot checks.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    2. Re:How are errors dealt with? by rojash · · Score: 1

      Did you even read that there are cameras and stuff ??

    3. Re:How are errors dealt with? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but at a store I get a receipt right then and there I can check and point out if there is an issue, and someone is there that can look at my cart right away to resolve it.

      In this case, it'd be more like dealing with a credit card dispute which quite often ends with the consumer losing and the vendor keeping the money. If the system screwed up, say a camera didn't catch something like you putting something back, or miscounted how many you grabbed at once, then what? Anyone who you appealed to would also miss the count and you'd be screwed.

    4. Re:How are errors dealt with? by olsmeister · · Score: 1

      It would not be in Amazon's best interests to screw customers over like you are fretting about. They wouldn't be customers anymore, and probably neither would their friends and family.

    5. Re:How are errors dealt with? by rmdingler · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but at a store I get a receipt right then and there I can check and point out if there is an issue, and someone is there that can look at my cart right away to resolve it.

      In this case, it'd be more like dealing with a credit card dispute which quite often ends with the consumer losing and the vendor keeping the money. If the system screwed up, say a camera didn't catch something like you putting something back, or miscounted how many you grabbed at once, then what? Anyone who you appealed to would also miss the count and you'd be screwed.

      The 2018 State of Chargebacks Survey from Kount and Chargebacks911 found that, of the 82 percent of businesses that said they respond to chargebacks, half win 30 percent or fewer of their disputes, one-fifth of those merchants win fewer than 15 percent.Feb 1, 2018

      And, for me at least, a good part of the reason I shop online beneath the umbrella of an Amazon or Newegg is the customer-friendly dispute resolution and generous return policies... it seems likely that their brick-and-mortar stores would continue this successful practice of customer appeasement, at least until a threshold number of disputes is reached by a single customer.

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    6. Re:How are errors dealt with? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I've been to their store in Seattle. As you pick up or place items back on the shelf, it tracks it. Only once you walk out the door does it charge you, and in about 30-60s, your itemized receipt appears in the app. You could just stand there for a moment and check. I will say, however, that I'm not sure how much the store employees can actually do. It seemed all powered by the app, and if there was a problem, I don't know if they could do anything right there.
      There are cameras *everywhere*, not so much to watch *you*, but to watch what you pick up. It's actually quote an impressive setup, and I was surprised it worked so well.

    7. Re:How are errors dealt with? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you show up and the other party does not - you win by default.

  5. I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I don't even have a smartphone, nor do I want one. Just like those "no cash, only card" shops here, I just won't shop there. Because I pay cash, and cash only.

    1. Re: I don't have an "app" by spinitch · · Score: 1

      Mass transit, convenience stores , and much more support FeliCa cards that can be charged with cash. A similar device a bit more cost but cheap smartphone could be offered for these stores and more including use of POSA coupons. Lower priority since target audience for these convenience no check out line stores are premium consumers who are willin to pay for the privilege and have a smart phone. Need to pilot and debug especially hacking before large scale roll outs.

    2. Re:I don't have an "app" by rjr162 · · Score: 2

      I'm about ready to go this route too in the name of disconnecting more.

      Sucks more places don't or can't give a discount for cash only sales. A good number of smaller gas stations around my area do for the price of gas (you save around 10 a gallon if you pay cash)

    3. Re:I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So.. shop at other stores?

      Almost everyone has a smart phone these days,about 95% of the population, so you are in a small and shrinking minority.

      Or you could always join the rest of us in the 21st century. Otherwise you will find yourself increasingly left out of modern society.

    4. Re: I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If youâ(TM)re intending to buy something important, get a flipping receipt.

    5. Re:I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Congratulations but nobody gives a shit, grandpa.

    6. Re:I don't have an "app" by mark-t · · Score: 1

      One of the biggest reasons I've heard that places don't take cash is because by not having any cash on premises, the safety of the workers is increased. If would-be thieves know in advance that there isn't any cash on site, then they aren't going to threaten an employee there to empty their cash box in the first place. One could argue that as long as people insist on using cash, they are endorsing to continue to put such workers in harm's way.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
    7. Re: I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Otherwise you will find yourself increasingly left out of modern society."

      You say that like it's a bad thing or something.

    8. Re: I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > You say that like it's a bad thing or something.

      It's just a choice. The Amish are doing fine. Nothing wrong with living how you want.

    9. Re:I don't have an "app" by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      If would-be thieves know in advance that there isn't any cash on site, then they aren't going to threaten an employee there to empty their cash box in the first place. One could argue that as long as people insist on using cash, they are endorsing to continue to put such workers in harm's way.

      No, it's the opponents of UBI and national health care who continue to put such workers in harm's way.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    10. Re:I don't have an "app" by Paul+Carver · · Score: 0

      Why does slashdot have a moderation of +1 Interesting but not a -1 Uninteresting?

      I'm baffled that some moderator found your lack of a smartphone interesting. I'm interested in lots of things and I'm capable of recognizing that things I'm not interested in are interesting to other people. But your not having of a smart phone and not using of a credit card is the antithesis of interesting.

      I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with you lacking things that the vast majority of the population has. I'm simply saying that there's not the least bit of value or interest in reading your post about what you don't have.

    11. Re:I don't have an "app" by Paul+Carver · · Score: 2

      Sucks more places don't or can't give a discount for cash only sales.

      As a volunteer at a community theatre I sometimes have worked in the box office. I HATE people who pay with cash. It is so much easier to close out when all the sales are credit card. Just press the "batch" button on the machine and it prints out a report of the day's sales and you're done.

      Counting the dirty wrinkled torn cash is a tedious nuisance and then finding that you don't have enough small bills to leave as change for the next shift and somebody needs to go to the bank. Or worse starting a shift and seeing that the last shift left you a stack of twenties as "change".

      As a volunteer I put up with it for the sake of keeping the community theatre in operation, but if I were an employee of a company I'd damn well expect to be paid for that tedium and hassle. Why should the owner give you a discount for creating extra work that he/she has to pay me to do?

    12. Re:I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      One of the effects we saw here with that move is the fast-talking grannies out of their pin&chip card at their door scam. Frankly I'd rather have the occasional shop robbed at knifepoint (very few guns in this country), also since they tend to be well-outfitted with cameras and the like, there'll be plenty of people around some of whom will have no truck with ne'er-do-wells and will hook'em to the ground or something, and are staffed with young people with stronger hearts than grannies tend to have.

      And, of course, there's the problem that no electronic payment anything is as close to anonymous as cash is. Fix that problem and I would mind having to pay by card a lot less. But somehow no electronic payment provider will ever consider that. That power transfer --since information is power-- alone is a good reason to resist the move away from cash.

      In that light, stores trying to make me pay by card are doing a lot more than simply protecting their employees: They're shoving the problem onto people who are much less equipped to deal with it. That's even accounting for the employees, since the shop owner is an entrepreneur and as such ought to bear the associated risk, IOW he should have insurance policies covering his employees, as well as the appropriate security measures. IMO that is much fairer than fobbing off a related risk to the customers... or the grannies in the neighbourhood.

    13. Re:I don't have an "app" by rjr162 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Many places do it because of the typical purchase amounts compared to the fees the processor charge.

      I know that's not true for all companies/businesses, but around here a lot of smaller ones operate this way.

      As a consumer, it tends to be easier to monitor spending when you have a physical representation of dollars in a wallet vs a piece of plastic for a lot of folks

    14. Re:I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "I don't even have a smartphone, nor do I want one. Just like those "no cash, only card" shops here, I just won't shop there. Because I pay cash, and cash only."

      We know.
      You also have no TV.
      You told us already, many, many times.

    15. Re:I don't have an "app" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Sucks more places don't or can't give a discount for cash only sales"

      You mean, because they have to check your money, have change in stock, count it, bundle it, recount it. put it in sacks and seal it, put it in an expensive safe with armed guards until the motorized armed guards transport it to a bank?

      And you want a discount? Sorry, the card owners' money just appears in our bank account as if by magic. Go buy somewhere else, bum.

    16. Re:I don't have an "app" by Gojira+Shipi-Taro · · Score: 1

      FWIW, when moderating, I find that "Overrated" against something moderated "Interesting" that doesn't deserve it works just fine.

      And agreed "I don't carry a smartphone" and "I have never owned a TV" are some of the most useless, narcissistic sorts of posts here. Like "Really? you think I give a single flying fuck that you're a proud Luddite? How about discussing the matter at hand instead of making a smarmy, dismissive post about how you find technology distasteful?"

      --
      "Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
    17. Re:I don't have an "app" by mark-t · · Score: 1

      And, of course, there's the problem that no electronic payment anything is as close to anonymous as cash is.perhaps not *AS* anonymous... but still pretty darn anonymous, owing to the "needle in a haystack" principle.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
  6. The store has had "uncharged item" issues... by Chas · · Score: 1

    Let's see how long before the Chicago store is picked BARE.

    --


    Chas - The one, the only.
    THANK GOD!!!
  7. And if anyone doubts that stealing is easy... by Chas · · Score: 1

    I invite you to watch this.

    https://youtu.be/JbyjL9tazxQ

    --


    Chas - The one, the only.
    THANK GOD!!!
    1. Re:And if anyone doubts that stealing is easy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So basically he walked into the store with a bag full of groceries and bought mints.

  8. no cashier checkout by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I want to see one of these in downtown Detroit.

  9. so that means cost comes to customer right? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So, these stores have cheaper products right? Since there are less staff correct? Oh they don't? Cool, won't shop at a place that records my every move and then asks me to pay full price

  10. Cameras by DrYak · · Score: 1

    According to the summary, it's currently done by camera which track whatever the clients are picking-up or putting back on shelves.

    Which mean that Amazon will in practice be charging for anything that it saw a client pick-up from the shelve but not put back.

    Thus in the case of the parents joke :

    I you dirnk your coke before leaving, you can't hope Amazon missing it (unlike if they relied on RFID tags going through a checkout gate) Amazon will charge you one bottle of coke, because it saw you picking one, but didn't saw you putting one back on the shelf.

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  11. and Walmart sucks now.. by rojash · · Score: 1

    I used to praise Amazon as being the Walmart of the internet for their awesome CS, (Walmart gave me a brand new watch replacement when the battery they put into mine didnt work and ever since my world was rocked!) - even taking used stuff - no questions asked But of late Walmart CS has sucked big time. Bitch in Morrisville, NC store refused to take back my water bottler saying it was used - yes bitch, bcoz I used it, I told the lid keeps falling off when I bicycle. She made me wait for long for a Manager and finally relented when she saw I was unwilling to back off. Needless to say - no more Wamma for moi !!