16 ms·
It's most annoying when businesses make IG their actual website, or restaurants have their menus there, etc. I've never been on IG and can't access the content,
by totallywrong 3y ago
It's most annoying when businesses make IG their actual website, or restaurants have their menus there, etc. I've never been on IG and can't access the content, so they don't get my business.
- tough 3y agoYou can still go to the restaurant to eat presumably they'll have some paper menus in there, or QR's or whatever
- luma 3y agoOr I can go to any of a hundred different places that don't lock their info behind Zuck's paywall.
- faangsticle 3y agoSure, you could also just go to a supermarket. If you don't know what to expect, why risk it?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mr_mitm 3y agoIt's not that big of a risk to be honest. People did it all the time before the internet. Some people are not pathologically risk adverse and might even enjoy being surprised.
- mhb 3y agorisk averse
- bee_rider 3y agoIt was how restaurants worked for a long time. Of course, if you prefer the predictability of seeing the menu before you get there, that’s your preference, fair enough. But I wonder if you might miss out on some places run by cooks who put all their talent into cooking, and none into technology. Could be some good stuff…
- aaomidi 3y agoTalent isn’t a zero sum game. It takes next to no effort to throw your menu as a photo on google maps for example.
- wizzwizz4 3y agoThat would not have occurred to me as a thing to do. It takes non-zero effort to think of these things in the first place.
- aaomidi 3y agoEvery business needs marketing, even the most basic coffee shop. Maintaining an online presence is just part of running a modern business. You’re free to not do it, but the market will push you out in favor of businesses that do.
- pdntspa 3y agoIt would be nice if the technology people would stop expecting everyone to cater to them.
- aaomidi 3y agoYou mean market forces that pushes the companies that make their business less accessible? I personally don’t expect anything. I’ll just not go to places that don’t have information. That’s the market in action.
- wizzwizz4 3y agoMarket forces are made of people. You can't just abdicate responsibility for your actions by saying "I'm making financial actions, therefore it's the invisible hand doing it, woooo!".
- steveklabnik 3y agoExample of how this falls apart: you change your prices. You change your menu. You have different menus for different times of day. You have different menus for special occasions.
- totallywrong 3y agoI've actually stood up and left restaurants when their QR menu sends me to IG.
- tough 3y agoHahahaha I was picturing this idea before asking tbh... We sometimes get some customers who hate the QR's, or claim not having phone/signal/whatever. I'll lend them my phone to check...
- arrowsmith 3y agoOr you could just print a goddamn paper menu?
- wpietri 3y agoWho still has a printer? Maybe they could fax you one instead?
- duckmysick 3y agoPrint shops. Restaurants already source their materials and equipment from other suppliers. They don't grow their own food; they don't need to print their own menus.
- wpietri 3y agoSure, the same is true of anything written. But much of that has shifted to digital media because it's more convenient. A print shop has much higher latency and change costs. The newer restaurants in my neighborhood mostly use flexible ways of conveying prices. QR codes, menus on big screens, chalkboards, or computer-printed paper menus on disposable paper.
- boring_twenties 3y agoMore convenient for the restaurant, less convenient for the customer. This defeats the whole purpose of a restaurant, which is to be convenient. If I wanted to be inconvenienced I would just buy groceries and cook them at home.
- tsukikage 3y ago> presumably they'll have some paper menus Increasingly commonly, that's a "nope". If I don't have an internet-connected device capable of dealing with a QR code about my person, eating out is no longer for me. Perhaps it's time to go back to the old people's home, the nurse has been searching for hours.
- bee_rider 3y agoOr, I have no idea how these QR providers work, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this was the sort of low-effort service that restaurants don’t want to pay for. So, maybe ad/tracking funded. It is annoying when a transaction that for ages has been all-paper gets bumped into the panopticon.
- toast0 3y agoQR codes can encode many things, including a url. If your restaurant already has a reasonable menu online, you can just link to that. No need to pay anyone, other than if you fancy print the qr code notices.
- bee_rider 3y agoIf I owned a restaurant that’s what I’d do, but the ones around here typically end up linking the QR code to some complicated website for some reason.
- Freak_NL 3y ago> If I don't have an internet-connected device capable of dealing with a QR code about my person, eating out is no longer for me. What kind of dystopian city do you live in? QR codes are on the decline again¹, fortunately. 1: https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/may/23/off-the-menu-why-restaurants-are-ditching-qr-codes https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/may/23/off-the-menu-wh...
- derefr 3y agoI can think of a large number of restaurants in Richmond BC that are still this way. (And only Richmond; neighbouring Vancouver/Burnaby/New West/Surrey are fine.)
- Garvi 3y agoAren't QR codes just a fundamentally flawed system due to how much easier they make phishing attacks?
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoPart of the motivation is to avoid having to produce Braille menus. Force your customers to use a device with built in accessibility features and you don't pay extra for ADA compliance.
- DropInIn 3y agoHow does a blind person use a QR code? Not like they can see where the camera is pointing, let alone locate the code in the first place.....
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoThe staff or someone with them scans it upon request.
- mindslight 3y agoThis sounds like "compliance" attorneys gone crazy. It's appalling, but does check out with the bureaucratic cancer eating our society. Waitstaff or the cashier reading menu options sounds like wonderful accommodation. Certainly much more so than impersonally telling a customer to solve their own problem by turning their dining session into a web browsing session.
- eddythompson80 3y agoThat's an extremely bigoted way of looking at it. Blind people deserve autonomy too as much as possible. How would you like it if the waitstaff just stood next to you to read the menu to you and wait for you to make a decision? Having a braille option is ideal, but not every vision impaired person can read braille and it puts a significant burden on every establishment. Readers provide a great alternative to that that restores a lot of autonomy to blind people. Why have ADA at all? Just have every disabled person wait for an able-bodied person to just help them with whatever it's they need, right?
- voytec 3y agoFrom my experience people making decisions on setting up these websites have no clue that such services are walled gardens. They saw an opportunity for free hosting with easy to use WYSIWYG editor and it looked like a no-brainer.
- guestbest 3y agoNot only that, they get likes comments and free protection from spam which is easy to moderate from their standpoint.
- nunez 3y agoat least they are all on google/apple maps you'll lose out on special events and deals, but that's probably an okay compromise. though there are some special cases where their hours on social media are more accurate than maps...