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not entirely serious, but not entirely joking: in a world where all stores are like this; you drop your phone and it smashes, can you still buy food? (what abo

not entirely serious, but not entirely joking: in a world where all stores are like this; you drop your phone and it smashes, can you still buy food? (what about people without phones?)

iandioch 9y ago
It looks like you need to scan in on the way into the shop. If your phone runs out of the battery, is it impossible to eat?
- samfriedman 9y ago
  Maybe a physical barcode card combined with some kind of biometric (thumbprint, faceID, microbiome biopsy) could form an "offline" backup authentication.
21 9y ago
I don't think we're that far away from not even needing the phone at all - it might actually be a "privacy feature", ie: give you the illusion that they don't know already who you are.
Tiktaalik 9y ago
This is totally a real problem. I just celebrated my grandmother's 90th birthday. She still lives independently and regularly goes shopping. She doesn't own a mobile phone, let alone a smart phone. In a world where services that require phones are dominant, choice narrows for elderly and low income persons.
- rtkwe 9y ago
  There's a lot of ways around the broken/lost/phone-less populations in a system like this. The phone doesn't really do any more than provide the initial authentication and receipt delivery. If these really took off and started replacing normal systems it'd be really easy to add a receipt printer and to add a card reader for a 'members card' that does the same thing as the QR code on the phone.
- 794CD01 9y ago
  Old people were never going to use this service anyway and already don't use self checkouts. But that's a small population that is only shrinking.
superasn 9y ago
That sounds like a premise for the next black mirror episode.. though they will make it a lot more scarier!
hbosch 9y ago
You need an Amazon account just to get in the door. I imagine the group of people with Amazon accounts and without cellphones is small enough to ignore.
TheEzEzz 9y ago
Jordan from Standard Cognition here (we're building a competing autonomous checkout system). Not having a phone is definitely a big worry. Not all people even have a smart phone, even in the US, and of the people that do a lot don't have credit cards. One feature we're working on is a fully anonymous and phone-free checkout process if you don't have a phone. You walk up to a kiosk that tells you what you have and then you just insert your cash.
_greim_ 9y ago
AFAICT, the only role your phone plays is to display a some sort of QR code to a reader when you enter the shop, after which you can literally put your phone into airplane mode and it wouldn't matter. I don't see why you couldn't just as easily punch in a code, swipe a card, or just show your face to a camera upon entering. [edit] I don't think that's how Amazon implements it at the moment; it just doesn't seem like there's an inherent limitation in the technology that would require customers to have phones. It's just that it's only open to Amazon employees at the moment, so pretty much every "customer" is guaranteed to have a phone.

not entirely serious, but not entirely joking: in a world where all stores are like this; you drop your phone and it smashes, can you still buy food? (what about people without phones?)

iandioch 9y ago

It looks like you need to scan in on the way into the shop. If your phone runs out of the battery, is it impossible to eat?

samfriedman 9y ago
Maybe a physical barcode card combined with some kind of biometric (thumbprint, faceID, microbiome biopsy) could form an "offline" backup authentication.

21 9y ago

I don't think we're that far away from not even needing the phone at all - it might actually be a "privacy feature", ie: give you the illusion that they don't know already who you are.

Tiktaalik 9y ago

This is totally a real problem. I just celebrated my grandmother's 90th birthday. She still lives independently and regularly goes shopping. She doesn't own a mobile phone, let alone a smart phone. In a world where services that require phones are dominant, choice narrows for elderly and low income persons.

rtkwe 9y ago
There's a lot of ways around the broken/lost/phone-less populations in a system like this. The phone doesn't really do any more than provide the initial authentication and receipt delivery. If these really took off and started replacing normal systems it'd be really easy to add a receipt printer and to add a card reader for a 'members card' that does the same thing as the QR code on the phone.
794CD01 9y ago
Old people were never going to use this service anyway and already don't use self checkouts. But that's a small population that is only shrinking.

superasn 9y ago

That sounds like a premise for the next black mirror episode.. though they will make it a lot more scarier!

hbosch 9y ago

You need an Amazon account just to get in the door. I imagine the group of people with Amazon accounts and without cellphones is small enough to ignore.

TheEzEzz 9y ago

Jordan from Standard Cognition here (we're building a competing autonomous checkout system). Not having a phone is definitely a big worry. Not all people even have a smart phone, even in the US, and of the people that do a lot don't have credit cards. One feature we're working on is a fully anonymous and phone-free checkout process if you don't have a phone. You walk up to a kiosk that tells you what you have and then you just insert your cash.

_greim_ 9y ago

AFAICT, the only role your phone plays is to display a some sort of QR code to a reader when you enter the shop, after which you can literally put your phone into airplane mode and it wouldn't matter. I don't see why you couldn't just as easily punch in a code, swipe a card, or just show your face to a camera upon entering. [edit] I don't think that's how Amazon implements it at the moment; it just doesn't seem like there's an inherent limitation in the technology that would require customers to have phones. It's just that it's only open to Amazon employees at the moment, so pretty much every "customer" is guaranteed to have a phone.