
Amazon Go Grocery – Full store open now - totaldude87
https://www.geekwire.com/2020/amazon-goes-bigger-first-amazon-go-grocery-new-seattle-store-using-cashierless-technology/
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mortenjorck
Something I’ve wondered for awhile (unfortunately not before my first trip to
an Amazon Go) is what Amazon’s internal limitations are on the use of
biometric information collected in the course of an Amazon Go session.

Attempting to comb through Amazon's master privacy policy doesn’t yield
anything on biometrics, but as they are a second-order piece of PII, they
could simply be derived from “images and videos collected or stored in
connection with Amazon Services.” And they wouldn’t have to be sold to an
external company to be used within Rekognition.

Amazon really needs to draw a bright line around what they will and won’t do
with biometrics. Even this, however, should only be a stopgap to meaningful
privacy legislation.

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imglorp
There's more personal/private stuff than biometrics going on here.

Biometrics are WHO you are, including gait, but AI and cameras are able to
determine your mental state and responses to stimuli while shopping. It can
watch your gaze, which products you look at, which ones you touch and put
back.

Eg, what does it tell you if someone picks up a pregnancy test and puts it
back?

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joezydeco
I was a Go customer for a long time and it just boggled me how they couldn't
keep the shelves stocked with some items. I'm not talking about something
being sold out for half a day, I mean things not restocked in spans of weeks.
I've heard grumblings that Whole Foods is suffering the same fate.

I really don't see how this store has improved any of that.

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mikefivedeuce
I couldn't tell from any of the articles today if they're going to accept cash
or not. Given the push back they received on the first round of convenience
stores, it's interesting that it's not mentioned at all.

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drusepth
Forgive me if this is an obvious question as I've only been to the Seattle
convenience store twice and haven't heard about any pushback (but I could see
it resulting from basically making the store inaccessible to people who can't
afford a smartphone?), but how would they logistically accept cash without any
cashiers?

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mdszy
Every self-checkout I've ever used accepts cash. It's just a normal bill
acceptor.

Taking money out/providing change to the machines could be done on a scheduled
basis by employees that just do that.

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drusepth
I'm not sure the traditional self-checkout kiosks logistically fit into this
model, though. In a "normal" store, everyone needs to pay somehow, and
security (in person or in LP) can monitor/flag/stop people who try to leave
without paying.

In Go stores, you authenticate as you enter the store through a turnstile,
which ensures that even if you were to bolt for the door you'd still pay for
what you have and there's no reason for anyone to stop you (besides
potentially for suspicious activity).

However, once you start letting unauthenticated people into the store, that
entire system flies out the window and you now need to once again monitor who
needs to manually pay and whether they actually have or not as they're
leaving. You need to worry about when they pick up a can of soup and put it in
their pocket, but not worry about it for most other customers.

On top of that, accepting cash (even to a machine) requires additional
hardware installed (which comes with its own challenges like how easy it is to
integrate into whatever Amazon's using on their backend for inventory
tracking, etc) as well as manpower (to track/refill drawers, handle issues if
the machine has problems, etc). I imagine there could also be a potential need
for more security in a store that contains registers full of cash and goods
versus a store full of just goods. Lots of stores around here (in KC) are
cashless specifically for the safety argument.

Just seems like a lot of extra work that Amazon wouldn't intentionally commit
to for a store built on automating employees away.

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kart23
Theres just so many edge cases.

I think they are banking on 95% of purchases being just normal people trying
to get food, and that will offset the margin of loss here, since they pay a
lot less employees. Because they will definitely lose more product than a
normal grocery store.

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gamegoblin
Do you have any data/sources to suggest that is true? Amazon has credit card
info (and who knows what else) for everyone who is allowed into the store.

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kart23
What about kids? Are kids with their parents just not going to be let into the
store since they don't have credit cards? Or will they be associated with
their parents somehow.

What if the credit card info is fake or stolen? Are new accounts with temp
emails and stolen cards just not going to be let into the store? I've bought
digital goods off amazon with prepaid credit cards that had a few dollars on
them, and the purchase only got rescinded hours later.

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gamegoblin
In the Amazon Go stores, I can scan other guests in and anything they take
goes onto my account. I assume this is the same.

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fortran77
It's always been possible to do this in any store. Just grab what you want,
and run out the door. You do have to be fast, though.

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pwinnski
You have to be fast because there are a number of employees of the store
stationed at cash registers very near the exits. The point here is that those
employees don't exist here.

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gbronner
Typically grocery stores only have a 1-2% margin, and also have significant
shrink and inventory spoilage losses.

Curious to see what the actual operating costs/losses of the system will be --
will people fake AMZN credentials, fill a cart with steak, and walk out?

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Axsuul
How will they fake AMZN credentials? It's probably much harder to do that than
use something like a stolen credit card to pay with at normal grocery stores.

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blackrock
To be honest, Amazon Go stores are ridiculously overkill.

They have cameras everywhere, and use face recognition, and all kinds of
pattern detection algorithms just to determine what yogurt or salad you
bought.

All they really need is just an app. Take a picture of your product or
barcode, done. They can use the AI to recognize the picture of the product,
like your fruits and vegetables. Or just scan the barcode.

Then, just walk out. Once you exit the gate, your Amazon account gets charged.
No receipts. No cashiers. No more minimum wage jobs for a high school
teenager. Done.

(Unless their goal is to do human pattern recognition, face recognition,
movement detection, and gait detection? Which means they’re just using the Go
stores as an experimental test bed, to freely capture all that valuable data.
You consent to the data capture, just by walking into the store.)

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dickjocke
I guess that is an easier system to implement, but that's obviously less
ambitious and much less magical.

Why does Amazon do one day shipping? That's also huge overkill for 99% of the
stuff they sell. They do it because consumers want it, and will instantly
forget about all their disdain for Bezos, who btw seems to be growing in
unpopularity by the hour, for a more streamlined and hassle free product. I'm
not a huge introvert but my instinct is already to do self checkout. I can
keep listening to my music, don't have to do the "alright please insert your
card" dance, etc.

