Amazon is opening their new “convenience store” in downtown Seattle on Monday, known as Amazon Go – featuring no cashiers, no registers and a state-of-the-art surveillance system which literally tracks every single item in the store – sensing when shoppers place an item into their cart and charging their online Amzon account.
Every time customers grab an item off a shelf, Amazon says the product is automatically put into the shopping cart of their online account. If customers put the item back on the shelf, Amazon removes it from their virtual basket.
The only sign of the technology that makes this possible floats above the store shelves — arrays of small cameras, hundreds of them throughout the store. Amazon won’t say much about how the system works, other than to say it involves sophisticated computer vision and machine learning software. Translation: Amazon’s technology can see and identify every item in the store, without attaching a special chip to every can of soup and bag of trail mix. –NYT
The 1,800-square foot mini-market will feature items usually found in convenience stores – soda, snacks, condiments, etc. as well as items usually found at Whole Foods – a recent Amazon acquisition.
The checkout process is described as “shoplifting,” considering that the store automatically charges customers using the “Amazon Go” app. Meanwhile, actual shoplifting is reportedly difficult:
I tried to trick the store’s camera system by wrapping a shopping bag around a $4.35 four-pack of vanilla soda while it was still on a shelf, tucking it under my arm and walking out of the store. Amazon charged me for it.
Nobody knows what Amazon plans to do with their new “smart store” technology – with some speculating that they may even sell their system to other retailers – however it’s sure to cut into the 3.4 million retail cashiers in America – almost 6% of total U.S. employment.
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So in order to enter the store, I presume you must have an amazon account and they must link your presence to it upon entry.
I’ll stick to my local bodega. Thank you.
PS: shine a bright light into the cameras and they will be rendered useless. (I’m just making that up.)
LOL. No match for professional shoplifters. Guaranteed. Bring it on!
There are only two.
So this is how humanity ends. But when we all die off, who will buy from Amazon?
A future version of that technology will eventually be able to track and count the human population of this planet, which will reveal that it is not the official 7.3 billion but closing in on 9.
“… and a state-of-the-art surveillance system…”
LOL. Totalitarianism brought to you by your friendly, neighborhood, Amazon grocer.
The older I get, the less I like the direction in which humanity is evolving. Total surveillance and total loss of privacy to central demagogue. Perhaps there is a glimmer of hope with blockchain which will transform society to the point where nobody is in charge, complete decentralization, where everybody is part of some neural network. That may not work either though. We could end up like Borg technology – “Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.”
And they will definitely not sell your shopping list to your insurance provider….