from the who-is-going-to-ask-if-I-want-fries? dept.
72 years after [Clarence Saunders] attempted to patent his idea, advances in robotics, artificial intelligence, and other technologies are making the dream of a worker-free store a reality. And American cashiers may soon be checking out.
A recent analysis by Cornerstone Capital Group suggests that 7.5m retail jobs – the most common type of job in the country – are at "high risk of computerization", with the 3.5m cashiers likely to be particularly hard hit.
Another report, by McKinsey, suggests that a new generation of high-tech grocery stores that automatically charge customers for the goods they take – no check-out required – and use robots for inventory and stocking could reduce the number of labor hours needed by nearly two-thirds. It all translates into millions of Americans' jobs under threat.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:30PM (1 child)
sometimes i spit on it too
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:39PM
I love you. Seriously. Let's hook up!
(Score: 5, Interesting) by LoRdTAW on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:41PM (18 children)
We just have to retrain those 7.5m workers, at their expense, as automated checkout repair technicians. Then they can earn a decent living wage instead of whining about a government $15 minimum wage. What's that you say? We don't need 7.5m robocashier techs? Well I guess they can go find other jobs in... What? All the jobs were outsourced or replaced by robots? Shit. Let them starve to death I suppose.
(Score: 3, Informative) by EvilSS on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:49PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:44PM
Should have voted for Ross Perot
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:56PM (1 child)
Those who don't understand the above are probably horses ;).
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @09:59PM
Surplus horses --> reduced price of glue.
Surplus cashiers --> reduced price of soylent ??
(Score: 2) by Snow on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:53PM (10 children)
They could be truck drivers.
Oh wait...
Seriously though, something will need to change. Maybe a 20 hour work week? We will need to somehow figure out a way for society to gain value from automation instead of just the business owner. Perhaps robots need to be 'paid' some amount. That money would then go to welfare programs (universal basic income).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:59PM (2 children)
Don't pay robots. Tax them.
Taxes will be complicated. So Robots will seek help of professional bean countants.
That tax revenue would then to go welfare programs for wealthy children unable to find people who will voluntarily date them.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Touché) by maxwell demon on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:03PM
Taxes will be complicated.
You know who excels at solving complicated problems which involve numbers? Computers.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Bobs on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:44PM
FYI: Taxing robots will be problematic.
The definition of "robot" is flexible.
Is it one robot per job? No, it works multiple shifts. So 3 jobs for a robot cashier.
But what if 1 robot has 2 sensors, and so covers 2 checkout lines? Or if '1 robot' handles 30 checkout lines?
Or if you have an entire Amazon warehouse with 300 people that is replaced by '1 robot' that happens to have many manipulators?
I don't think it will work to have a "flat tax" per robot - you will probably have to get to a tax on the percentage of the value.
And how do you draw the line between "robot" and computer so you tax one but not the other?
Seems like the lines get fuzzy fast, particularly when you have people paid to look for loopholes and ways around paying the taxes.
It is going to be tricky, and a moving target to get it to be effective and to stay effective over time.
How would you do it?
(Score: 4, Informative) by LoRdTAW on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:39PM (2 children)
I can also see other major issues appearing:
anti-immigration (they took his jerb!)
Luddites (robots took his jerb!)
"class warfare" (they have a jerb and he don't!)
The old horse buggy/whip/horseshoe maker analogy doesn't apply anymore as they had a near 1:1 replacements. buggy driver-> truck driver, buggy maker -> truck body builder, whip maker -> upholstery maker (this might be a stretch), blacksmith -> truck mechanic. Now we have: job X -> robot. You can't turn a cashier into a robot mechanic because they don't need a 1:1 technician to robot replacement. They are screwed.
Those unemployable people will quickly turn on anything or anyone who they perceive as the reason for their poverty. Immigrants will fill an already saturated job market increasing competition. People with jobs will be resented by the jobless. Engineers who work with automation technologies might even become targets of violence from neo-luddites (unabombers).
A plan has to be worked on now as we are on the cusp of widespread automation and job elimination within the next two decades.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Snow on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:14PM (1 child)
It a good thing we have Trump at the helm. He'll make some great deal to fix this mess.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday August 17 2017, @08:19PM
The best deal.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday August 17 2017, @09:38PM (3 children)
Don't be crazy. I'm not going to work 20 hour weeks just because society has fucked itself up. At the very least, I can get two or three 20 hour per week jobs (though obviously, I'd rather just have one). The problem here is that society needs to get out of the way of employing people rather than taxing robots or mandating 20 hour work weeks that no one will obey in order to make a decent living.
In my view, taxes on robots is already a second order failure mode to a first order failure mode of interfering enough with employment that there's a huge incentive for most employers to automate or export jobs as much as possible.
I think first, we should try not to make the problem worse with terrible labor regulation. Then past that, realize that a bunch of unemployed workers is useless while more employers is extremely valuable and figure out how to get more of the latter.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:02PM (2 children)
Sure, Hallow, the problem with the economy is *too much regulation protecting workers.* Not fractional-reserve banking or shady loans programs or skeezy multinational corporate contracts or money laundering. Nope, it's those fucking OSHA laws that are causing problems.
Ye gods. Do you even HAVE a job?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday August 18 2017, @05:12AM (1 child)
Economies can have more than one problem. None of the items you listed can explain, for example, the slowness of job growth in the aftermath of the 2008 recession as compared to past recessions. Excessive burdens on job creators can explain that tardiness.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday August 18 2017, @04:23PM
"Job creators," wow. You parrot the Narrative like you wrote it. Creating jobs? Where, China? Viet Nam? The Philippines? Robot factories? Ye gods.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by legont on Thursday August 17 2017, @08:06PM
What we really need are consumer robots. I imagine an iphone buying itself a new skin using ether it mined, but I am just a stupid meatball.
A per humans, who cares? Perhaps one can enjoy a new gladiator exercise say the US vs. Russia nuclear war.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Friday August 18 2017, @03:14AM (1 child)
We've had automated (no human operator) checkouts here (not the US) for... I dunno, between ten and twenty years. It hasn't led to mass unemployment, hardships, food riots, and an armageddon-type war or whatever it is the OP is predicting. You just end up with a reassignment of jobs, or people shifting to new jobs that didn't exist before. Whatever the case, the overall effect seems to be zero.
Makes for good headlines I guess...
(Score: 1) by Sabriel on Saturday August 19 2017, @01:32AM
"(not the US)" "between ten and twenty years" "new jobs that didn't exist"
It's not actually one straw that breaks the camel's back, it's the adding of it to the rest...
(Score: 4, Interesting) by ledow on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:43PM (26 children)
I never understood why I can't just push a trolley out the store past a scanner. It scans the trolley for RFID tags, grabs all the prices from those. Maybe it takes an image of some kind / weight reading and any discrepancy of what tags / what weight/products show up is flagged.
Push trolley to exit. BBBRBRBRBRBRBRBRBRBRBBRBRBRBRB. Beep. 56 items. £155.27. How would you like to pay?
Then get rid of all the checkout staff.
Hire loads of security staff and cameras (to prevent people gaming the system) instead. Suck up any minor losses.
Literally it would shave 20 minutes off my shop, I wouldn't need to repack three times (pack trolley, unpack for checkout, repack into trolley, unpack into car, unpack out of car, repack into house), the trolley could literally be designed to just put it all into my car (reusable plastic boxes that detach or whatever.
All this modern tech and it still relies on a 16-year-old going... beep... beep... beep... GGRRRTtTT! "Er, Dave, can I have a price?" after you lay it out item by item in front of them and keep repacking it.
If you then motorised said carts, I would also buy twice as much shit because it's usually the "it's getting hard to push" that stops me shopping or picking up more heavy items.
Trolleys were invented to make people carry more, buy more and consume more without even noticing (imagine how many baskets it would take to fill a trolley).
If you then make checkout just a push, put a card in, drive it to your car, press "dump it in the back" button, everything becomes so much easier and quicker and profitable. Hell, even in the case of "the store is closing in ten minutes".... I often just abandon my shop in those cases because it's just not worth the mad rush.
The only problem would be restricted items (knifes, alcohol, adult-only items, etc.) but you can just put those in a section that only adults get to (like some stores have/had tobacco, alcohol sections, etc.) and have to show ID.
Every time I shop, it frustrates me that we still haven't removed the BIGGEST time killer of shopping, despite contactless payment, barcodes, little motorised belts, self-service lines, etc. All that fucking unpacking and repacking.
(Score: 4, Informative) by BananaPhone on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:16PM (3 children)
Then when you go home, the RFID tags still work.
They could use them to track people VERY easily.
If you pay with plastic, they know everything about you and link it to the tag.
Even when you donate the stuff to goodwill, they could tell that John Smith bought the item.
You'll see some people just trashing stuff just to keep their privacy instead of donating them to goodwill.
You'll see a new start up called 1-800-GOT-RFID to come to your house to remove RFID tags from your clothes/shoes to prevent Minority Report style ad tracking or to just destroy the item on site.
This will go on until laws are enacted to stop this.
(Score: 4, Touché) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:21PM (1 child)
Rent-A-Cop: Hey Thief! You're under arrest for shoplifting!
Shopper: I didn't steal anything.
Rent-A-Cop: The scanner reported that you stole the jacket you're wearing. The RFID tag didn't go through the check out scanner.
Shopper: I bought this jacket last year.
Rent-A-Cop: A likely story.
Shopper: Yeah, about as likely as management finding a way to screw up IT operations.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Thursday August 17 2017, @08:14PM
Exactly the same burden of proof as is they say the same to you in a normal store now.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:20PM
You're adorable :)
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:24PM (2 children)
How would you like to pay?
With cash? Good luck... And watch that line build up behind you while you try to get the machine to take those wrinkled old bills.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:44PM
Only Luddite shoppers shop with cash! Hip appy appers app their purchases with apps!
Apps!
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday August 18 2017, @01:07AM
Wrinkled bills? Around here they're plastic, saves money as they last and they go into machines nicely. Much better then getting stuck in a line with everyone using cards, shuffling through them to find one that works, screwing up somehow and having to start over, and if credit card, having to sign.
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:40PM (4 children)
For one thing, an RFID tag adds 15 cents to a product's price, which can add up for (say) a $1 protein bar. For another, how would this work for fresh produce that needs to be weighed?
(Score: 2) by driven on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:26PM (1 child)
Citation, please. http://www.nano-di.com/blog/how-can-rfid-tags-cost-1-cent [nano-di.com]
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:24PM
Google's zero-click result for rfid tag cost states:
Click through to the source it's quoting [barcoding.com], and that's for passive tags that don't have their own battery.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Friday August 18 2017, @07:17AM (1 child)
I bet, at one point, people said exactly the same about barcode, price-stickers and everything else.
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Friday August 18 2017, @02:22PM
The improvement in product package image quality related to barcodes eventually paid for itself because a packaged good can carry more information, reducing the need for store staff to answer questions. Fresh produce, on the other hand, often doesn't carry a barcode and thus still needs to be weighed at the checkout.
In addition, barcodes are passed over the scanner one at a time. The promise of "just walk out" checkout with RFID implies that some device will read, bill, and deactivate all tags in an entire shopping cart at once.
I'd be interested to see a proof of concept in more than one city of this being made to work.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Sulla on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:48PM (3 children)
American here. Personally I think that everyone having their own trolley is quite wasteful and probably dangerous. Maybe it is just an American thing but for how much Europe bitches about us having our giant trucks everywhere, a 25 ton trolley rolling down the isle is sure to kill the planet faster.
(I realize that trolley is evidently a cart, I just disagree with it)
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:39PM (2 children)
In Georgia we called them buggies. I'm sure that helps too :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:32PM
On skid row we call it a moving van.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:15PM
Actually, given TFA, I'm sure there's a joke about buggie whip manufacturers in here somewhere. I'll let someone else figure it out.
(Score: 2) by julian on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:37PM
Alcohol.
In California we passed a law that you can't buy alcohol through an automated system or self-checkout. Since I almost always buy beer when I make my weekly trip to the grocery store, I can never use self-checkout.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:40PM (2 children)
My sister pulls up to the supermarket, some guy(s) load her trunk with the items she ordered and paid for online, and she's on her way home. 5 minutes total.
Why is that not available everywhere?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:04PM (1 child)
It is, but the future not being distributed evenly means its not in people heads like the proverbial 80 year old grannie.
My local employee owned coop does this and it works pretty well. They need 24 hours warning and its "free" over $100 total (which is pretty easy to achieve, and its free only in the sense that employee labor to run this is embedded into prices)
1) I don't need less exercise and the HVAC in the store is almost as nice as at the gym.
2) Sometimes I'm in an adventurous mood and just need to see stuff. Its very easy to handle "I used the last of the simply asia thai kitchen red chilie 4 oz jar and I'm too lazy of a bastard to mortar and pestle my own chile garlic fish sauce stuff". Its very hard to handle "We are having a garden party on Saturday, buy appetizers that would look and taste nice for auntie and grannie"
3) Walmart food aisle is full of "people of walmart" the hipster SWPL organic store by the campus has lots of hotties walking around, why not enjoy the scenery? Kind of like why look at 2/10s at walmart when target sells the same chinese factory crap but the target girls are like 7/10 average. Not a darn thing wrong with enjoying the scenery.
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Friday August 18 2017, @03:52AM
Also, I never remember to add panko to my shopping list, so it really helped to see it on the shelf last week...
(Score: 2) by bryan on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:05PM (4 children)
Around here, the grocery stores all seem to keep 8+ self checkout lanes open and only 1 traditional lane open. I suppose the shoppers that want restricted items (tobacco, etc.) still need to use the traditional lane, but everyone else just checks their own items out already.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:25PM (3 children)
Self-checkout works well until you have more than a dozen items or so and/or actually buy produce (or dry goods or whatever) that needs to be weighed with codes entered and/or buy things with coupons that never seem to scan right (the in-store coupons for a "manager's special" or "quick sale" for a few dollars off are often the worst) AND happen to shop somewhere that doesn't have a machine that throws a fit if you don't deliver the item into the bagging area in under 0.5 seconds... oh, and aren't buying any very light or very large items. Or... I don't know, huge numbers of things.
In many of the above scenarios it is POSSIBLE to self-checkout, but for example having someone who might actually know produce codes or be able to navigate them faster through experience can be really helpful if you buy any significant amount of produce. I made the mistake several weeks ago of trying to go through self-checkout with about 20 items, including maybe 5 produce items and a few other things that didn't want to scan right (store deals, etc.), at a store I was unfamiliar with. I'm certain I spent at least three times as long there as I would have had I just waited behind the one person checking out at the cashier in the next aisle.
I used to shop at a big grocery store that had great prices, so families would come from a distance to shop. The majority of customers had carts that were at least half full, and many were often full or even overflowing. Self-checkout definitely doesn't work there either.
On the other hand, I've been to plenty of stores like you mention, where it seems one or two cashiers is plenty, because the typical person is only buying a few items.
(Score: 2) by bryan on Thursday August 17 2017, @11:21PM (2 children)
Agreed! Half of my frustration with self checkout lines are their insistence to "weigh" an item in the bagging area after you scan it. I normally bring my reusable bags with me, and even the slight weight of placing these cloth bags in the bagging area is enough to freak the machines out and scream "Remove item from bagging area!!!" Heavy items, like milk/juice/soda, will also throw off all future readings and don't always fit very well anyway.
RFID tags, needed for the Amazon style no-checkout-at-all method, seem a little overkill IMO. Are you really going to slap one of these big tags on a banana? Practically all cardboard boxes already have perfectly acceptable barcodes already. Simply remove the bagging area weight-check and the existing self check out lines will be much nicer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 18 2017, @01:42AM
> even the slight weight of placing these cloth bags in the bagging area is enough to freak the machines out
This one has a solution -- scan item, put on bagging platform (but not in a bag). Once everything is scanned and paid, then move items from platform into your cloth bags.
I do this with my small-wheel "shopping" bicycle that I bring into the store (instead of shopping cart)--items are all put into the bike bags, after I'm done paying.
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Friday August 18 2017, @03:55AM
The BBC had a story a couple of weeks ago about laser-tattooing grocer codes on avocados...
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:05PM
> "the store is closing in ten minutes"
You must not be from USA...where most grocery stores are 24/7 (except a very few holiday times).
(Score: 5, Interesting) by EvilSS on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:54PM (1 child)
(Score: 1) by slap on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:09PM
It's faster for me in the self checkout. Usually no one is in front of me, while there is a line at the regular checkout. Plus I can pack things better than the checker or bagger - less chance of damage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:13PM (4 children)
So, will the savings from not having to pay Cashiers go to lower prices (customer benefit), or to higher profits (corporation/shareholder benefit). I'd like to not be cynical, but I have a strong feeling it will be higher profits, while the customer does all the work.
(Score: 3, Touché) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:17PM (1 child)
Stores can enjoy the savings of not paying cashiers while I move my retail shopping to Amazon.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:15PM
They beat you to it. https://www.amazon.com/b?node=16008589011 [amazon.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:42PM (1 child)
Both. Wal-Mart's business model, for example, demands they make their money primarily on volume rather than profit margins. If they can save a dime, at least half of it will go to lowering prices rather than profit.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:49PM
Nope. Wherever Walmart has created a monopoly by driving out all competitors, save a few niche boutique retailers, it's all Pr0fit!!!
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:13PM (6 children)
The more the stores move to self check out, the more I will move to Amazon.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by snufu on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:00PM (5 children)
Who still drives to a brick and mortar store for stuff they can buy on Amazon?
Who buys meat and produce from Amazon?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:12PM
Ah but why would you have to buy raw materials if you could get the finished goods aka food you want delivered to you, or if you could go to a restaurant. I know many restaurants are expensive but think about why walmart is cheaper and restaurants aren't. What if walmart went a step further and cooked the produce? They can charge more but they might still be more efficient than their customers at doing the job.
It's not like many people are that good at shopping for groceries, cooking, keeping track of groceries, leftovers, etc. If you don't have a kitchen and don't need a big enough fridge to store the larger amount of groceries, you can save a fair bit of rental in some cities.
You may be able to cook better than some random burger flipper, but in the future a robot might be able to cook better than you.
That said, there might eventually be "3D printer" equivalents for producing cooked food. Might not involve meat.
Of course this makes civilization a lot more specialized, interdependent and very fragile... But it's already so fragile and interdependent anyway ;).
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:38PM
Amazon may not be an absolute solution. But I can still use it to the maximum extent against stores that try to force me into self check out.
It may be necessary to make infrequent trips to larger stores to buy meat and grocery items in bulk to the extent that it can be stored in freezers in the garage. But if that's the game the retail stores want to play, then I can't stop them.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Thursday August 17 2017, @08:20PM (1 child)
I do. I want to pay with cash so that my purchases cannot be tracked. Why would anyone want to live in a world where companies and government have all this information about you? Convenience is not worth sacrificing my privacy and anonymity for.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @09:58PM
I wish more people gave a crap about this!
Guess we'll have to wait for violations to become common enough, for the drunken MBAs to try and impress a date with how much power he has over people, basically for humanity to realize just how easily this data can be abused. Between blackhats selling the data and redhats "freeing" all the information it is inevitable for larger scale bad things to happen.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Thursday August 17 2017, @09:25PM
Amazon does suck for some grocery shopping. Was trying to buy dark brown sugar last night (just finished the last box on some cookies). The prices are double/triple what a grocery store should sell it for. It should be like 2$.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:40PM (16 children)
I fucking hate self-checkouts. I'll happily go to another store a few miles further away rather than use one.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by Zal42 on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:53PM
Me too. I avoid them like the plague.
But the reason that I hate self-checkouts is that they're a serious pain in the ass. I'm not against the concept of them. I confess, however, that I can't see how they could be made any better -- particularly when you're buying things that have to be weighed.
If stores started having nothing but automated checkout systems, I'd probably just shop elsewhere. There are a number of stores that I already refuse to shop at for various reasons, adding a few more isn't that big of a deal.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:54PM (3 children)
Why?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:36PM (1 child)
Most automated checkouts I have visited don't take cash/make change.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:04PM
I do all my grocery shopping at Target where the self checkout takes $50 bills and makes change.
(Score: 4, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:25PM
Mostly because they're making me be a checker and I resent that. I don't want to do it, I'm not nearly as quick at it as someone who does it for a living, and they're not paying me or giving me a discount to use the machines. Besides, I'm a people person.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:09PM
Surprise! A popular named nigger like the Niggery Uzzard hates self checkout. He wanna be keepin it real, chat up the cashier, keepin an eye on that sweet ass. If all the cashiers lose their jobs, where will a nigger like Uzzard find poor young white women to fuck with his big black cock?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by nobu_the_bard on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:30PM
I like them. Regular cashiers are so slow and wasteful, outside of a couple of outliers in either direction. I'm typically through the line much faster. Also, many places like Wal-Mart employ a better strategy for the queue leading to them (one queue for 4 to 8 stations) than for other lines (one queue for each station) which helps too.
(Score: 2) by WalksOnDirt on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:42PM (3 children)
I like self checkout. I frequently feel like I'm getting the bum's rush when I use a cashier. If I'm doing it myself I can make sure the prices are right and I'm getting all the discounts I'm entitled to. With all the weird pricing going on in the major chains now, like mix and match five items for a discount, it can be hard to figure out.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:21PM (2 children)
Unless you're selfishly oblivious to the line forming behind you, you should feel like you're getting the bum's rush from everyone waiting impatiently to use the machine while it bleats at you, "please take your items, please take your items."
Yeah you're just a control freak. The cashier can't be trusted to do the job to your exacting standard. You don't want the cashier's low pay or poor job security, though, oh no. You just want to control the work.
(Score: 2) by WalksOnDirt on Friday August 18 2017, @02:41AM (1 child)
It only takes a few seconds. It's just that without a cashier to perform for it's easier to think.
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Friday August 18 2017, @05:27PM
I agree, I just wish the self-checkout registers weren't crippled. I've worked at a grocery store before, I know how to scan items faster than one every 10 seconds. If I was allowed to do so, it wouldn't be so fucking annoying using them. Also, the fucking thing has a scanner, I should be able to scan my id if I want to buy alcohol instead of waiting for the cashier.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by VLM on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:15PM (3 children)
Self checkout is a SWPL / whiteopia thing. You can't have those in diverse areas, crime too high. First indication of an area becoming "not so nice" is they remove the self checkouts and replace with human drones. Drive until you see a strip mall consisting of nothing but popeyes fried chicken, a rent to own store, three payday loan establishments, and a grocery store, there won't be any self check there.
Basically if the weekly police blotter in the newspaper's website is all about drunks and car accidents they can have self checkouts. Once you get violence and car breakins and muggings in the police report, the self checkouts get removed. You can also see it in shoplifting reports, if some dumb kid does something dumb every couple months the store can afford the losses of that ethnic group. If the police report is full of car thefts and muggings, the store can't afford the losses.
To have self checkout at a store is inherently white privilege. Even for white people, could you imagine a bank being run where you simply walked into the vault, put however much cash you'd like in your wallet, then on the way out signed a register of how much you took and who you are? Or a bar or restaurant where you served yourself whatever want and paid the bouncer on the way out? This only happens in racially and ethnically homogeneous areas, aka whiteopias, mostly the wealthy ones at that.
(Score: 2) by Bobs on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:57PM (2 children)
Interesting, So you live in a world where white people don't commit crimes?
Different reality from the rest of this planet.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:14PM
The worst part about that post is, I don't think he's using "whiteopia" ironically...ye gods.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @10:47PM
He lives in a reality where he is a racist shitbag and is too stupid to realize it. Ramblings of a madman.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Friday August 18 2017, @03:45AM
Same here. I'll stand in line for a cashier rather than use the vacant self-checkout.
I regard self-checkouts as trial runs of cashier-free retail, and I'm not gonna encourage 'em.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:41PM (14 children)
Where are the SN trolls going to work?
Aristarchus and Ethanol won't be able to afford their energy drinks!
(Score: 2, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:44PM (13 children)
Dude, you're behind the times. I dunno about aristarchus but EF has a pretty fair job last I heard. As do most of our named trolls.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Funny) by EvilSS on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:23PM (2 children)
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:28PM
Bull milker, I would guess. Or test subject for various radioisotopes.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Touché) by JNCF on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:48PM
A beautiful carny.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:25PM (2 children)
Hell, I hear one of our named trolls [soylentnews.org] is a President of the United States :D
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:56PM (1 child)
So when will that job be automated as well? I mean, apparently you don't need too much intelligence for it, so I'm sure AI research will catch up soon.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1) by Farmer Tim on Thursday August 17 2017, @09:47PM
Came for the news, stayed for the soap opera.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:40PM (5 children)
It's amazing how everyone on the internet has a great job!
Must be all those 'leet skills used to post crap on websites they didn't build.
(Score: 2) by WillR on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:25PM
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday August 17 2017, @06:46PM (3 children)
Hey, I actually do have a pretty decent job and a pretty good life. Maybe not all trolls do, but I do. And I"m sure there are other trolls who do okay.
I don't build a "web site", but a "web application", which is not of the "social media" variety.
I don't care to go through a self check out line. I don't mind waiting (a reasonable time) in a check out line if I don't have to scan, bag and load everything in the cart. Especially heavier items. I'd rather put money in the local economy. But stores that force me to self check out are really just going to force me over to Amazon for more and more of what I buy.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:15PM (2 children)
Trolls get good jobs by trolling their way into jobs. The name of the game is emotional manipulation. Shitposting is practice for the kind of persuasive shitspeak they use to scam their way into the good life.
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by VLM on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:49PM (1 child)
Not bad AC, but there's more to it. Better jobs usually means more time and ability for corporate bullshit. Some of my best shitposting is inspired by corporate bullshit I've heard at work. I could fill binders full of shitposts inspired from the comedy show that was diversity training class. I've heard some amazing stuff at company wide "motivational" meetings too, fertilizer content so high its liquid miracle grow for shitposting. There's probably an age aspect too, I've probably heard 30 times as much corporate BS as a 23 year old recent grad, for obvious reasons, so I have 30 times the shitposting power, just like a guy who's been lifting at the gym for 30 months should be able to outlift a guy who started lifting a month ago, all things being equal, as they usually aren't, LOL. To paraphrase the classic lifting phrase, "Dude do you even shitpost?" I don't think its possible to live the corporate life for even a decade without the result of being able to shitpost with the best on 4chan or here.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday August 18 2017, @02:43PM
I have decades of experience on that hypothetical (or not) 23 year old recent grad you speak of.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JNCF on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:45PM
aristarchus strikes me as an ivory tower dweller, but that's just inference and assumption. I believe I've seen him argue that academia is a nobler pursuit than industry. My memory, as always, may be flawed.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:12PM
I can see the idea of a store becoming nothing to but a giant vending machine (GVM) with a better UI. It would probably have to give you the option of looking at an item without buying it first, though. Some may resist the idea, but I for one would welcome the vending machine overlords if they make it easy to locate/identify items. I find no pleasure in visually hunting in the isles for something I'm looking for.
Some like casually browsing, but that's not me. In fact, that may be a downside to the idea from a sales standpoint: browsing humans tend to buy more than they intended. But no store technique will make everyone happy; there will still be browse-friendly stores even if GVM takes off for those who want git-er-done convenience.
(Score: 2) by snufu on Thursday August 17 2017, @05:22PM (5 children)
95% of my grocery purchases are routine. There is no reason I need to go into the store, find it on the shelf, physically inspect it by hand, check it, and bag it. For these items I should have a one-click shopping list on a web page or phone app, followed by my picking up the bagged items at a drive through or curbside. I would also gladly pay extra for drone delivery and accept the risk of spoiled perishables.
I am especially insulted when markets give me no option but to scan and bag my own items. I extract wages for this surprise forced labor on my part by accidentally failing to scan the bar code on the aged whiskey, smoked salmon, and imported cheese.
(Score: 3, Informative) by VLM on Thursday August 17 2017, @07:25PM (4 children)
I'm definitely a small time criminal, but I eat paleo which means plenty of veggies, and when their online produce "code" application takes more than say two minutes of searching the worlds shittiest online UI to find "organic green beans" because its so slow to scroll or its mysteriously not filed under O, G, or B (probably filed under F-ing "haricot verts" just to F with shoppers) a couple times I've said "Life is too short; Fuck this Shit" and after the little old ladies and girl scouts finish looking horrified at me, I type in the produce code for idaho potatoe and call it good enough for supermarket work. I mean, seriously now, I'll scan UPC codes all day, but I'm not gonna do a price check for fucking green beans or organic beans or haricot verts or "freedom beans" or WTF. I paid "something" so its not outright theft, their system sucks ass so I feel the need for compensation, all produce costs about the same per pound as indicated by salad pay-per-pound bars, and I put forth a more than reasonable effort. It should be possible for the last 10 to 20 years to use optical scanning to determine what you're buying instead of legacy UPC and produce numerical codes. Especially since they could optical scan everything entering the store pretty trivially....
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Bobs on Thursday August 17 2017, @08:04PM (3 children)
So above you claim "Self-check ... only happens in racially and ethnically homogeneous areas, aka whiteopias, mostly the wealthy ones at that." Because non-white people steal from the stores with self-checkout.
And then you admit you steal from the store using self-checkout. From your various posts it sounds like you consider yourself "white."
Notice a contradiction?
The issue ain't the color of the skin - it is the honesty of the customer.
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday August 18 2017, @01:03AM
Crooks always dee everyone else as crooked.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 18 2017, @07:24PM (1 child)
It's all a statistics game to the corporations. Maybe in his alleged "white privilege" area it costs more to hire cashiers too.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday August 19 2017, @01:03PM
On that shelf its code 2581351 for (weird name brand) green pepper, the aisle next to it is the salad bar code 101, I've run a lot of stuff thru as "salad bar" not just "all potato are idaho potato" type of issues.
There's also the good faith issue. There's a big ethical difference between selecting one of three types of onion off the shelf, searching the online database for a couple minutes, finding 17 varieties in the DB of which they're only selling 3 today, and "F it, its a sweet onion" regardless of name brand or whatever, vs sneaking the onion in my backpack and slinking out of the store without paying a dime.
Another aspect of the good faith issue is produce really is roughly constant cost per pound. I wouldn't slap a ground beef tag on a tenderloin, or slap a tag for "bulk wheat flour" on "bulk saffron" (as if such a thing could exist) but eh, their system sucks, I have a work around to make it suck less, they get about the same amount of money and I get about the same amount of food, no sweat.
Where's the paycheck and 1099 for my working as a cashier for them? If they don't like my volunteer cashier work they really wouldn't like my volunteer shelf stocker or floor cleaner work ... they can solve that by hiring a cashier, perhaps. When I do volunteer work I try my best, but, hey you get what you paid for and I didn't sign up to be a cashier anyway...
There is a slippery slope ethical argument where the next step is claiming that checking the produce pile of avocados and not buying the mushy rotten ones is "stealing" from the store because someone has to buy all the avocados and I'm not buying my share of rotten ones. Yeah I'm not buying that argument either.
The store seems very happy to sell all produce for a fixed salad bar price, but for inventory control reasons or whatever BS they want name/rank/serial number of each apple sometimes, but not if I buy it from the salad bar, whats up with that? Their failed inventory control system is not an obligation of mine; we traded my money, for their apple, using a crazy (admittedly knowingly failing) computerized system they devised... not seeing a problem here.
Partial cooperation with a partially operational broken system seems quite fair.