
Amazon Go - mangoman
https://amazon.com/go
======
elicash
I worked at a grocery store for several years, and one thing I recall is
customers CONSTANTLY putting items back in a random aisle, rather than where
they found it.

I wonder how this tech deals with that? Maybe they figured that out, too. But
I was amused in the video when I saw the customer putting it back where it
belonged, because that's not how I remember that going...

All that said, this is fantastic and exciting.

Edit: I also hope they're already thinking about EBT cards and WIC.

~~~
Cthulhu_
I really wouldn't trust 'picked up off the shelf' detection, not without the
whole thing looking like a giant vending machine. RFID tags on products
probably works better.

~~~
stevenmays
I think RFID tags are too expensive to put on every product. I may be wrong on
this.

~~~
jpalomaki
Quick search on Alibaba shows that on volume these are just $0.01 each (and
probably lower when you buy larger volumes). Of course sticking these to each
product is inconvenient and I would assume the tags are not yet built in in
most grocery product packaging.

[https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/China-Professional-
ma...](https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/China-Professional-manufacturer-
providing-low-price_60513577468.html)

~~~
makomk
Alibaba sellers will list almost anything for $0.01 each, though, regardless
of actual selling price.

------
Merad
I hate it when companies offer a "how this works" section that doesn't
actually tell you a damned thing about how it works.

* How does my Amazon account get associated with the items I take?

* How are items detected when leaving the store? If my friend and I walk out side by side, how does it know (if it does) which items are mine and which are hers?

* What happens when someone picks up an item and leaves without first doing whatever check-in/registration/setup is necessary?

~~~
Peroni
These are purely assumptions based on what I saw on the video alone:

>If my friend and I walk out side by side, how does it know (if it does) which
items are mine and which are hers?

Looks like the entry/exit is the same type of set-up you find at most large
office buildings with the tap in/out gates (see screenshot:
[http://i.imgur.com/e7fDglY.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/e7fDglY.jpg)). I assume it
only lets one person out at a time which also suggests your friend could only
enter the store if they had an amazon go account and tapped in themselves.

>What happens when someone picks up an item and leaves without first doing
whatever check-in/registration/setup is necessary?

Again, based on those gates, I'd assume you can't actually access the store
without going through the necessary set-up first.

Personally, I'd like to know what happens if/when my phone battery dies in-
store.

~~~
csears
It looks like you don't need to scan anything when exiting. So your phone
could die once you're in the store and you'd still be able to check out.

I'm guessing the Amazon Go app generates a one-time-use QR code that gets
scanned on entry and then security/tracking cameras follow you all over the
store. If the cameras see you in front of an item when its RFID sensor detects
it was picked up, they make an educated guess that you picked it up. Then they
can re-scan all the RFIDs as you exit for extra confirmation.

~~~
phire
They probably don't have RFID sensors on the shelving, and if they did they
would only be able to detect when you walk several feet away from the shelf,
and would have huge problems if two people were standing right next to each
other at the shelf.

It looks like they have a row of cameras along the top of each shelf that will
be used to detect when you pick up and place items back down.

The RFID tags are mostly useful at the gates to confirm the visual data and
feed back into the machine learning algorithm.

------
Someone1234
Companies have been discussing "checkout-less" stores since forever, but
nobody has been brave enough to do it due to the perceived threat of
shoplifting.

And while shoplifting is a legitimate threat, are non-shoplifters going to be
turned into shoplifters without a checkout? Are normal shoplifters stopped by
checkouts? These are the core questions, and until it is tested nobody will
know for sure.

Target is getting awfully close to this. With their Cartwheel app you're meant
to scan all your items as you shop (so it auto-applies coupons and discounts);
but they haven't taken it to the next logical step and allowed you to provide
your Cartwheel output at the checkout for checking out.

I will say that the way Target has implemented smartphone barcode scanning
makes me think that there might be a future in all this. It is extremely
painless, they just need to stop kicking you out of the scan screen when it
finds a discount (i.e. it doesn't kick you out if no discount is found, but
does when a discount IS found, that's problematic for efficiency reasons).

~~~
bbrks
In the UK, Tesco have been running a 'Scan as you Shop'[0] thing for a couple
of years now. Customers pick up a scanner as they enter, scan their items as
they go into their cart, and they have special checkouts which read your
scanner.

There's a random chance that your scanner will be audited by a human against
the contents of your shopping cart. Usually the first time you use it, then it
backs off.

[0] [http://www.tesco.com/scan-as-you-shop/](http://www.tesco.com/scan-as-you-
shop/)

~~~
BjoernKW
Tesco also has pushed self scanning tills for years now.

However, the number of employees working at the cash register is still the
same because those scanners sometimes do not work and most importantly their
user experience is deplorable. So, you frequently have to ask someone for help
(and I'm in my mid-thirties and very tech-savvy. I can only imagine how
someone twice my age would feel when using these scanners).

~~~
crottypeter
Terrible UX is spot-on.

I was using one of these just this morning: got all my shopping onto the
scale/shelf and was getting ready to pay. The machine asks how many 5p bags I
used. So I start packing the stuff into my backpack to find out whether I need
a bag. The machine pipes up: "Did you remove something from the scale?" The
screen has a full screen modal warning that I have to put the shopping back.

I put the things back on the scale and guess that I won't need a bag and I pay
using contactless but what if my shopping won't fit in my bag?

I understand why we have to "pack" things onto a scale (it makes it much
harder to take things without scanning them) but it has to trust you at some
point.

~~~
lorenzhs
Just say you brought your own bag and put the backpack on the scale. Then put
things into the backpack as you scan them. Sometimes it'll request an
attendant to confirm that it's empty (probably because it's heavier than most
bags).

~~~
crottypeter
Yes, but i always think that will take ages ;-)

------
delegate
Look, I know this might not be a popular view here on HN, but I think this is
useless. And bad.

I'm not talking about the technology behind it (I think it's an amazing
achievement)..

I live in Barcelona and I have at least 5 medium-sized supermarkets within 5
minutes walking distance from my home. Plus there are several smaller shops
that sell fruits and vegetables.

I know all the people who work in these supermarkets. The cashier in the
supermarket downstairs always sings a quiet song while she scans my products,
she knows my daughter and she's always nice and friendly.

The cashier in the other store talks to the customers. She stops scanning and
starts talking while the line waits. Some customers might join the
conversation. I know she has an old cat that eats an unlimited amount of food
if allowed to do so...

There are similar stories about other shops in the neighbourhood - they come
to work, they serve the people in the neighbourhood, they go home. They do
this until they retire.

These people like their jobs because we respect them for what they do, so they
feel useful and they work hard.

I don't mind waiting in line for 3 minutes. Or 5. It's never longer than that,
even if the cashier discusses the latest news with the old lady.

The humanity of it has value for us here and that value is greater than the
time we'd save by removing the people from the shops.

~~~
crazypyro
Trying to save jobs that are no longer the most efficient way of solving a
problem is not the way to promote the value of humanity, in my opinion. People
want groceries as cheap and fast as possible. They don't go to the grocery
store for social interaction and forcing the majority of people to pay extra
for something that only the minority get value out of is not a competitive
strategy.

If humanity were to take your opinion, we'd never evolve as a society, lest we
remove a need in society and with it, someones job.

~~~
CrLf
I am unsure we are evolving. We have evolved in many areas that solve real
problems, like healthcare and such, but I'm not sure today's society is any
better for all the technology that allows us to save a couple of minutes in a
queue.

To improve the efficiency of a particular group, we create problems elsewhere.
The result may not be net positive. In fact, I think it isn't, since those
saved "couple of minutes" will probably be spent browsing Facebook.

~~~
Ph0X
The point isn't that we save 2 minutes, it's that there's now 10 less job we
need. And that may seem as a negative at first, but the idea is that as more
and more job get automated, prices should go down until the point where people
will not have to work full weeks anymore, or rather, focus on learning and
reaching higher education, rather than doing dummy work all day (aka just
scanning items non stop for 8 hours).

~~~
mikeash
It might be worthwhile to re-frame it. Rather than say "10 fewer jobs," say
"10 people are no longer forced to spend eight hours a day sitting in front of
a cash register."

That assumes we can find something better for them to do, of course. But man,
we have to _try!_ Forcing people to do things a machine can do is inhumane.

~~~
rescripting
I'm a bit worried that most of us here on HN are feverishly working on ways to
automate away jobs, and there is quite a strong economic incentive for us to
do so, but there is hardly any effort and no incentive for policy makers to
catch those affected. Who is building and planning for this new social utopia
once people no longer have to bag groceries? Right now it looks like a lot of
misery and poverty on the horizon before things get better.

~~~
mikeash
I totally agree. Getting rid of wasteful jobs is a good thing _if_ you can
somehow handle the people who lose those jobs, whether redirecting them to
something more productive or pensioning them off or whatever. And that side of
things really doesn't seem to get much attention. There's a lot of hand-wavy
talk about basic income, some lip service paid to continuing education and
retraining, but not a whole lot really being done to prepare.

~~~
avar
Getting rid of wasteful jobs is a good thing regardless of whether you can
handle the people who lose those jobs in the short term.

The job-saving technology will live forever, long after the people who are
temporarily displaced die. You're doing an immense amount of good for the
untold number of people who aren't even born yet.

Technology is also global, but the political problems associated with
eliminating jobs are problems on a state-by-state basis. Is it immoral to
develop a technology just because some political systems are incapable of
handling the gains in productivity, while other states are?

~~~
mikeash
I would never say it's immoral to develop the technology. The tough question
is how to deploy it.

------
vyrotek
They will most certainly be tracking a lot more than just you picking up your
item. The data they collect about shopping behavior will be interesting.

Like, how long I hesitated before I picked up something, what I had already in
my "cart" at the time, what deals I looked at but passed on, etc.

~~~
chei0iaV
Welcome to the Skinner Box.

If you take a slice of cake, hold it for 12 second, frown, put it back, spin
clockwise three times and buy a lowfat plain yogurt, you will get a discount
for sugar-free pastry on your next visit... if you did it just right.

~~~
i336_
Oh no. There are a whole group of people who will learn to get really good at
this thanks to computer games...

Hopefully the next generation of shopping carts have dashcams on them?

------
nihonde
This strikes me as yet another over-engineered workaround for a problem with
society. In Japan, I rarely wait in line at a grocery store or convenience
store. If I do, it's a short wait, and my interactions with the staff often
brighten my day a little bit.

Why is Japan different? For one thing, they use a checkout system that is
designed to move lines quickly. Two employees can work concurrently, one
ringing up a customer and the other handling money exchange with another
customer. Customers do their own bagging in a seperate area. The POS system
takes cash in and spits out the correct change, and also handles IC cards,
credit cards, Apple Pay, etc seamlessly and usually without requiring anything
more than a PIN at most. And of course, customers can prepare exact change or
get their cards out and place it on the tray while the cashier is still
ringing them up. And the final, most important element is the people--polite,
attentive, careful, and professional. Cashiers are trained to call out every
item and price, and offer extras such as ice packs for cold items, dry ice for
ice cream, utensils for ready to eat items, and so on. A quick, efficient,
pleasant interaction that ends with a bow and a gracious thank you goes a long
way toward encouraging everyone to treat each other well. And, by the way, the
money that would be sunk into Amazon's infrastructure and inevitable support
services goes to keeping people in jobs.

~~~
literallycancer
I pay with a contactless card when I do my shopping, so the money transaction
takes about a second. It's still too slow, because you have to put your stuff
in the bag/backpack etc. (admittedly, this is the shop's fault - they don't
have the separator so people can load stuff while the next person is being
ringed up).

But in most countries, it's not that the shops can't make it faster, it's that
they don't want to. They make the biggest margins on the impulse buy
merchandise along the queue and people won't stop going there just because
they have to wait 3 minutes.

>And of course, customers can prepare exact change or get their cards out and
place it on the tray while the cashier is still ringing them up.

Good luck putting your card on the tray in poorer countries :D :D, good way to
get it stolen.

>And, by the way, the money that would be sunk into Amazon's infrastructure
and inevitable support services goes to keeping people in jobs.

Keeping people in jobs is of dubious value, especially since Amazon's
infrastructure would create jobs too, it's not just money disappearing and
things materializing out of thin air.

~~~
nihonde
Keeping people in jobs is absolutely not of dubious value. And if you think
Amazon Go is designed to create new jobs, I think you're in for a serious
disappointment. Working at a grocery like Aeon is probably a legit full-time
career for a lot of single mothers, elderly, and others who need jobs that
don't require advanced degrees.

~~~
literallycancer
I'm going to steal something I saw in my social media feed a while ago: "I'd
like people to move away from the notion that people need to be doing boring,
tedious things in exchange for money".

And I can guarantee that there are zero businesses designed to create jobs.
Businesses are designed to create value, jobs are a byproduct.

There are going to be fewer and fewer jobs in the future, and the sooner
societies adjusts, the better. Keeping people in unsustainable jobs will only
slow this transformation.

I'm biased, by the way, because I'm from a post-communist country - we've had
the "jobs for everyone" thing, and it wasn't working very well.

~~~
nihonde
I agree with you about jobs for the sake of keeping people busy. However, one
of the great lessons I am learning in Japan is that human beings are capable
of exceeding automation, as long as those human beings are participating in a
healthy social environment. In the West, we often set low expectations for
people because we cater to the lowest common denominator and we tolerate
socially regressive behaviors. The dark side of Japanese society is a
willingness to cut bait on people who aren't team players and a vulnerability
when leadership isn't up to the task. On the other hand, there is a tremendous
distribution of skills and the work ethic is astonishing to my American eyes.
People unironically aim for perfection in even the most menial tasks--
something that I think is the key to personal satisfaction and has a huge
benefit to the society at large.

------
helipad
Technology aside, shoppers are going to feel so weird doing this at the
beginning.

There's already social anxiety when people pay for things and walk past a
security guard, or a security barrier. Whether it's an airport, or a clothes
store, or a ticket barrier, there's always a nervousness about being called
out.

It's bad enough in the Apple Store where you can pay and walk out, this will
take some real getting used to.

~~~
intrasight
What they should feel weird about is the battery of security cameras that will
watch your every move.

~~~
rtkwe
Why? You're already recorded pretty heavily in every chain store you go into
for loss prevention.

~~~
iainmerrick
Right, but it's not typically tied directly to your online account (as far as
I know!)

Retailers are definitely pushing in that direction with things like Bluetooth
LE beacons that talk to your phone. Plus store loyalty cards and the like,
which have been around for decades. But those schemes have mostly been opt-
out, apart from those weird stores that require membership cards.

~~~
rtkwe
I just don't really see how associating it with an online account makes it
much better or worse than the normal recording that'd done in stores everyday.

~~~
iainmerrick
Really? I may be on CCTV in every store I go into right now, but (as far as I
know!) they don't look me up on Facebook etc, log which shelves I'm browsing,
and track me across multiple stores.

Maybe I'm underestimating what other companies are already doing, but it seems
like Amazon is pushing the envelope here.

I guess governments are increasingly doing this kind of thing too, and that's
also very troubling, but the silver lining is that at least they aren't doing
it so they can bombard me with targeted ads.

------
blackaspen
Here's an ad from IBM circa 2006 predicting(?) this:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eob532iEpqk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eob532iEpqk)

Crazy to think we're actually here now. And even sans-RFID.

~~~
softbuilder
It's actually from the 90s [1]. So much so that I thought it was one of the
AT&T "You Will" commercials [2].

[1] [http://digest.dx3canada.com/2015/05/12/retrofuture-
ibms-1999...](http://digest.dx3canada.com/2015/05/12/retrofuture-
ibms-1999-forgotten-receipt-commercial-imagines-rfid-matrix-style/)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2EgfkhC1eo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2EgfkhC1eo)

~~~
blackaspen
Glad to know I wasn't alone in thinking it was an AT&T one...that's what I
searched for first. Those were the 80s though, right?

~~~
softbuilder
1993\. I had to look:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_Will](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_Will)

And David Fincher? Wow. No idea.

------
spyckie2
Here's my speculation on the technology behind it:

Tracking. A lot of tracking.

You don't need deep learning and car sensor technology to do simple rfid tag
pick up/drop offs to detect what you have in your cart.

No, this technology probably fully tracking your every movement in the store.
It may use rfid tags to detect what you have, but that is not the main tech.

When you walk in and scan your phone, a camera array will scan you to create a
footprint on who you are and link it to your ID. Then your every movement will
be tracked by various cameras throughout the store.

You walked 3 steps, took a step back and looked at the advertising on the
right? We recorded it.

You went to the cereal aisle first? Picked up a box of cereal and then put it
back in favor of another one? Yup, we recorded it too.

If this is indeed the case, then the correctness of what is in your shopping
cart is going to be very, very high and there will be no need for an honor
system, randomized checks, or other mechanisms to prevent inaccuracies.

Shoplifters will probably get away with the first shoplifting but will
probably get profiled immediately and unable to do it multiple times.

~~~
nawitus
Here's my rough sketch on how this could work:

a) You track every person from multiple camera angles, it should be
"relatively easy" to track the position of every customer at all times. I'm
not sure if it can handle people in very close proximity (or e.g. after
hugging in store) - maybe Amazon actually uses facial recognition to resolve
the identities afterwards

b) Only one person can enter the gate at once, and it's easy to authenticate
the person at the starting point

c) Leaving is also a one-way gate, and at that point the system can simply
mark the shopping as complete and mail the receipt

d) The shelves are specially designed and can sense (maybe with RFIDs) when an
item is removed from the shelf, and match that with the person closest to the
item. A possible difficulty is handling people who take an item from the back
of the shelf (e.g. to get a fresh item).

~~~
spyckie2
for d) it could be a combination of rfid, closeness, and cameras detecting who
grabbed it.

------
patrickg
Not many comments about privacy. This is how I see it: You are identified when
you enter the shop and amazon knows exactly the products you buy.

If you have the choice to buy or not to buy at the shop, that's fine, it is
your decision. But let's imagine that in the not so far future, all shops in
your neighborhood are like this. No way to go shopping whithout given exact
trace of you, your location, the stuff you buy, the time you buy, the amount
of food etc.

We all know that too much data is not good for us (yes, I am looking at you,
my government).

While I like the idea of not standing in a line and wait, I really wish that
these shops offer a prepaid anonymous card for those who don't want to be
totally tracked.

~~~
wallacoloo
There are a lot of social issues that a system like this might entail, in
addition to privacy:

1\. Not everyone has a smartphone.

2\. Not everyone has an electronic account with which to pay (or for practical
reasons, they can't use it frequently).

And the people that fall into those categories aren't just fringe. Parents
give dollar bills to their kids & send them to the store to fetch food. People
without established credit might _have_ to use cash for purchases, etc.

~~~
chipperyman573
Can't people with no credit open a checking account and get a debit card? I
was never askef for a credit score when opening one of those.

~~~
wallacoloo
Probably - I don't know the procedure. I do know most people consider debit to
be a less secure (for the consumer) form of payment than credit or cash
though.

------
bennettfeely
What happens when my phone battery runs out while shopping in the store?

What happens if I don't replace an item in the exact same place I picked it
up? I'm charged for it I assume.

How do you purchase produce or vegetables, all these thing need to be packaged
individually I assume. So much for concern for the environment...

Is the occasional line in a store really worth having your every movement
tracked by Amazon and your image taken throughout your time at this store?
Sounds like a store straight out of 1984.

Are you poor or without "a supported smartphone"? Forget about it.

Amazon is a company that tries new things and that's good, but here we have
yet another example of tech nerds "solving" a problem that doesn't exist.

~~~
rtkwe
> What happens when my phone battery runs out while shopping in the store?

From the look of the video the phone isn't required for checkout. The flow
looks like you scan in then camera's and other sensors track you through the
store then you just walk out and the items are scanned and totaled.

> What happens if I don't replace an item in the exact same place I picked it
> up? I'm charged for it I assume.

Then just put stuff back where you got it. You shouldn't just leave items
randomly strewn throughout the store already.

> How do you purchase produce or vegetables, all these thing need to be
> packaged individually I assume. So much for concern for the environment...

It's not a full grocery store, it looks like it's all packaged foods and fresh
daily kind of prepared foods.

> Are your poor or without "a supported smartphone"? Forget about it.

Judging from the video, any Android or iOS device should be able to function,
all it needs to do is display a QR code and a receipt no RFID or even a decent
camera.

> Amazon is a company that tries new things and that's good, but here we have
> yet another example of tech nerds "solving" a problem that doesn't exist.

Why does everything have the address some deep underlying problem. Some things
just make life a little easier or more convenient and that's ok.

------
owenversteeg
How has nobody mentioned the worry that you'll get overcharged? I'm sure
computer vision isn't perfect, however close it may be, and once you've left
the store (presumably when you'd check your receipt) there's no way to prove
you didn't take whatever you were charged for. I'd be pretty worried about
accidentally "buying" something I didn't actually take, even if that's
statistically unlikely. (Yeah, I know, it doesn't make sense to worry about a
1 in 10,000 event, but people aren't rational.)

Or, if they decide to side with the consumer and give you your money back,
then that opens them up to theft - go in, buy stuff, "oh I didn't buy
$expensive_item!", get money.

~~~
losteverything
I would go further and say that static pricing will not be exclusive. No
prices on the shelves but prices as you scan. Person 1 purchasing at 8am
Tuesday will not pay same as person 2 Friday at 534pm.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
I doubt it. I don't think many people would go for it if there are no marked
prices. Not to mention that's probably illegal in many jurisdictions.

------
jtcond13
Your periodic reminder that 'retail salesperson' is the most common job in
America (~4.5 million).

[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/04/the-10-m...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/04/the-10-most-
common-and-10-least-common-jobs-in-america-today/274526/)

~~~
gech
It's just a starter job, people shouldn't rely on them as a career, it's their
fault, bootstraps, etc. etc.

~~~
mabbo
For the large percentage of Americans who don't have a degree or maybe not
even a high school diploma, there is no such thing as a 'starter job'\-
there's just 'a job'. Heck, for a growing proportion of the population the
degree doesn't even help.

We in the tech industry would be wise to remember that we live in an
incredibly privileged bubble where careers are real things, where it's easy to
find new opportunities.

~~~
tjr
During college, I worked for about 6 or 7 months in a local supermarket.
Seventeen years later, some of my former coworkers are still there.

------
tom_pei
So it seems that most people assume that this kind of shop is a replacement to
major grocery stores. I dont think that this is what their initial customer
base is going to be. I see this more inline with "Fresh & Easy" kind of
markets where on the go customers can just stop by for a quick bite or a quick
pick up of resources like a 7/11 or something similar. I can see that they may
want to expand to supermarkets but I think this is more addressing the quick
easy supermarket market and focusing on easy pickups rather then full fledged
supermarkets for all grocery needs. I may have missed something but that would
be the most logical and successful way for Amazon to introduce this
technology.

------
excalibur
What happens when you don't have enough money available to Amazon to cover all
the things you grabbed? Do they give you a window to return items before
banning you from the store and/or notifying police?

~~~
wehadfun
Wonddered the same thing. Also what if you dont want your purchases to end up
in the cloud. Can you still pay with cash?

~~~
ccostes
Considering there are no cashiers or checkout counters, cash seems like a no-
go.

~~~
CaptSpify
I'd be interested to see if they have manual-fallback in case "the system is
down"

------
JackFr
What do you do with your children? What about your non-Amazon co workers who
came out with you to get lunch? Do they stand on the sidewalk while you shop?
Do you swipe them in? Do they get swiped in as guests (who then shoplift
cupcakes?)

Don't get me wrong -- this is exciting and impressive -- but needing to swipe
in to enter a store is, I think, a very significant change to how we think of
stores as public places.

~~~
Shanea93
> but needing to swipe in to enter a store is, I think, a very significant
> change to how we think of stores as public places.

CostCo rule #6: Your membership card must be shown on entering the warehouse
and at the tills.

I don't think it's really that much of a change, this is already par for the
course when it comes to bulk-purchase stores.

Another one of CostCo's rules:

> Parents are responsible for their children. They must be kept with them at
> all times.

And one last one:

> Members will be required to purchase any packages opened or damaged by them
> or their guests.

These are all pretty ubiquitous rules for this kind of store and I can't
imagine people will really notice the difference. You'll use your card to
swipe in you and your guests, when you leave as a group, your card will be
charged.

If you come with someone who also wants to buy things, you jut enter one after
the other instead of as a group.

~~~
JackFr
That's a good point -- but in general, CostCo or any similar discount club
I've been to doesn't really prevent physical access -- there's no turnstile.
(Though my experience is limited - I'm not a member - so I typically am with
friends or family.)

~~~
dimino
The only difference is CostCo employs a "turnstile", whereas Amazon will build
one.

------
MatekCopatek
When I started reading the description, I thought: "someone finally delivered
on that RFID pitch of just walking out of the store". Was surprised that it's
actually computer vision.

~~~
mdorazio
Same. I remember predictions of RFID-based shopping becoming the norm 10 years
ago, but it never happened. Does anyone know why the tech didn't pan out that
way?

~~~
lis
RFID tags are still to expensive in the supermarket context. The margins are
usually razor thin (at least in Germany) and the products are quite cheap.
Even when buying RFID tags in bulk they are too expensive.

~~~
kalmi10
Disclaimer: I am more or less pulling this numbers out of thin air.

Assume that having a single cashier costs $15 per hour. Assume that an RFID
tag costs $0.05. Assume that in average a cashier handles 1 item for only 5
seconds (including payment).

That means that a cashier can handle 720 items per hour, and that costs the
supermarket $15. Having RFID tags for 720 items would cost $36. That's still a
~$20 dollar difference, which still amounts to ~$0.028 per item.

I would be willing to pay that if that means i can forgo the checkout lines.

~~~
lis
That sounds about right. Depending on the store, though, the cashier will
handle a lot more articles. E.g. at Aldi, a cashier is expected to process at
least 3k articles per hour.

The big problem is: Most people are not willing to pay for that :) Depending
on the product, 1-2 cents might be your whole margin.

------
halotrope
So technically they built something to automatically detect shoplifting (but
charge to customer in the process).

If this worked in generic stores they could make a killing with theft
detection services.

~~~
swalsh
Amazon makes a bigger killing by having a competitive advantage of not having
to worry about theft. Just like Kiva gave Amazon an edge in warehousing, this
gives them an edge in meat space stores.

------
ChaseT
NPR's Planet Money podcast did a story two months ago with the inventor of the
self checkout machine, Howard Schneider.

At the end of the end of the episode he was asked what his "dream" supermarket
would be, and he said one where people don't have to check items out. They
walk in, grab something, walk out, and are automatically charged.

This seems to be exactly what Amazon has done. Pretty amazing to see the
realization of his dream be announced only two months after his interview.

------
MertsA
So what happens when someone asks a good samaritan to help them get some
expensive item off of a high shelf? How does this deal with things like a
couple shopping together, one with an Amazon account and one without where
both of them are getting items off of the shelves?

Even if all of the video was monitored by a human I can still envision several
pitfalls to this where it's hard to know who to bill for what without
interacting with the customer.

~~~
joezydeco
See my theory above. There's no real inventory of your items until you walk
out. What the vision system is doing is matching up your account (scanned upon
entry) to the lane you choose when exiting (where the items are scanned).

~~~
jaypaulynice
So the food tags have disposable rfid/bluetooth enabled? Or the computer
vision is to be able to scan the bar codes even when they're not visible? Any
issue with the amount of radiation in that store?

~~~
joezydeco
That's my guess. RFID in the labels or packaging somewhere.

RFID radiation is no different than the radiation coming in and out of the
phone in your pocket.

------
tristanho
"Our checkout-free shopping experience is made possible by the same types of
technologies used in self-driving cars: computer vision, sensor fusion, and
deep learning."

Very interesting choice of comparison ha... I suppose this is Amazon trying to
attract the tech crowd? It almost sounds satirical.

Not to downplay the tech -- this looks incredible.

~~~
r3bl
From the rest of the text and the video, I have absolutely zero idea how they
are using deep learning here. And let me not even mention that they've used
the AI word in the video.

So, I highly doubt that attracting the tech crowd will work if they don't
explain the damn thing about how they are using it.

~~~
swamp40
Most people here are assuming there are RFID tags on every product.

But I think they are watching the shelves and visually identifying when a
product leaves, what it was and who took it. And if they put it back on a
different shelf, a different camera sees that and it is removed from the
person's "shopping cart".

They are using their internal employees to train the AI or AI's (maybe one per
section of shelf).

Imagine a Kellogg's employee assigned to watch each of their cereal boxes and
make a list when someone takes one.

That's how I think they are using AI here. Hundreds of them in the store.

------
tdaltonc
Is the basic idea that there are cameras everywhere and they watch and record
everything you touch?

Now I can't stop thinking about the behavioral analytics. Can they get rough
pupil dilation data? I'm sure they can get facial expressions and maybe gaze
tracking.

Next step is using kiva bots to rearrange/restock the isles when no one is
looking.

~~~
camtarn
Ha, that's a great idea. Partition purchases by hour, figure out which
products are bought disproportionately often in particular hours, and for the
top three of those products, Kiva their shelves either to the front of the
store (if you want to optimize for greatest throughput) or the back of the
store (to optimize for longest time-in-store to increase impulse buys) ;)

~~~
ccostes
Oh god, "Now where did the bread aisle move itself to today?"

------
syphilis2
This has been in the eye of retailers for a long time (such as the bar code
scanner guns some stores let shoppers use) in part because it makes it very
easy for shoppers to (over)spend. Retailers are always looking to eliminate
barriers to customers purchasing things. Amazon has a few convenient
innovations that make shopping faster: one click purchases, subscription
services, the dash button, and possibly one day a grab-n-go grocery. This post
doesn't intend to demonize Amazon, these are all innovations that make
shopping easier, but I think it's good financially for customers to be
cognizant of how this convenience impacts behavior.

------
20tibbygt06
What happens when parents walk in with kids? Does little Bobby need his own
account for everything he's going to touch and pickup?

What if I walk in with a friend on our way to somewhere else and they don't
have an account and I'm just getting something quick, do they not get in and
wait outside? Everybody in the video was just one person or all had an
account/phone.

Overall, I hope this works and expands. Checkout lines can be a hassle at
times.

------
kennystone
The queues at stores have always been the worst part of the experience. You
put stuff in a bag, which is effectively a queue, then you wait in a line - a
human queue, then you de-queue your cart on a belt, which is another queue, it
gets scanned item by item and then placed right back into a similar bag to
where it started. Good job Amazon for finally working to eliminate the queues.

------
iainmerrick
It's amazing how this combines just about every cutting-edge trend and hot
topic in technology, both good and bad:

\- Elimination of low-level jobs

\- Elimination of cash

\- Deep surveillance (cameras everywhere, online tracking)

\- Assuming it works, it will seem pretty magical!

 _(edit: formatting)_

------
sytse
This is amazing, I admire Amazon for their boldness. It seems very practical
for users. I assume that you can dispute charges with the app and that they
store the footage of you to resolve disputes. I'm sure they'll need some times
to tune the algorithms. But disputing a charge via an app is better than to
wait in line. Kudos to Amazon for innovating.

~~~
Ph0X
It's definitely an interesting technology and a bold idea, but personally I
have far more issues with grocery stores than just a 2m line.

For me, the far more time consuming part are:

1\. Finding where something is (yes, after months you'll slowly memorize it
all, but when you're new to a grocery shop, this easily takes 3-4 minute per
item you need.

2\. Choosing between the dozens of options.

The other day I went in this new store just to buy a shampoo and a mouthwash.
For each there were over 30 near identical products and I spent way longer
than necessary deciding which to go for.

With amazon fresh, I can at least search for a specific product, and also read
reviews and specifics right there on the page. Amazon Go doesn't solve any of
those problems...

It feels silly to me to create a whole store just to solve a tiny little
problem that is grocery lines.

------
teaearlgraycold
Am I normally unaware of Amazon's new products, or have they been releasing an
abnormally high amount of new offerings recently?

~~~
iyn
Most of the announcements were from AWS re:Invent event:
[https://reinvent.awsevents.com/](https://reinvent.awsevents.com/)

------
makecheck
I wonder how much extra revenue a typical store can expect from the “impulse
buy” sections at checkout counters? Unless the entire exit to the store is
littered with impulse-buy displays, they might be losing that chunk of revenue
and have to make up for it somehow.

Also, it already seemed more convenient to _not go to the store in the first
place_ (ordering online), especially for the kinds of items in packages that
would work well at this type of store. The missing convenience was one that
store employees could give you: let you pick out the _fresh_ things you want
(like produce and baked goods) and have someone box those up for you and even
ship them to your house.

~~~
Jpoliachik
Amazon didn't build this to generate extra revenue on 'impulse buys', they
built it to collect a fuckton of data. And while they own the retail space,
delivering fresh food isn't easy with their infrastructure. I'm guessing
they'll Beta the Amazon Go system for a few years, then offer it as a service
to existing Grocery chains. THEN fresh food delivery will be a snooze, since
Amazon will have access to the Whole Foods down the road.

~~~
shawabawa3
> delivering fresh food isn't easy with their infrastructure

Don't they already have pretty widespread grocery deliveries?

------
rewrew
A bunch of grocery stores here on the West Coast are replacing their self
checkout lines and going back to checkers. They're saying that it's to
"improve the customer experience" but people in the industry know (due to
tests done by other retailers who bypassed the technology once they tested it,
like Costco), its because of product loss/shoplifting. I know it's not apples
and oranges but I do think that the loss margin is going to be so high on this
that only Amazon will be able to eat this -- and I think they know this.

------
SCHiM
Haha yes, hackers are going to have a field day with this!! I'm sure it's good
enough for users which don't actively try to game the system through technical
means, but I suspect it won't stand a chance against someone who's taken the
time to understand and undermine the system.

On another more on-topic note, what an awesome time to be alive! :) When I was
younger concepts like this were usually paired with flying cars and space
travel in cartoons, but now it's real.

~~~
TulliusCicero
Ah yes, I'm sure there'll be legions of hackers stealing groceries in
meatspace for kicks while being watched by multitudes of cameras.

~~~
SCHiM
Heh your definition of the word hacker is way too narrow if you think all
we're doing to sitting around behind screens all day spouting 31337 sp34k on
the interwebz.

No, you're wrong. If it can be done it will be done. It's just too much reward
versus the risk. Stealing this way scales too well. In a normal shop the risk
of detection is variable, and therefore higher on average. Sometimes people
will be alert, sometimes not, sometimes there will be guards sometimes not.
Now this is different, it's all down to following the correct number of steps
to get the desired results.

If you replace these two stickers, now scan this then switch this...

It'll be down to a few bits in some chip somewhere that decides how much you
need to be billed. I'm sure it won't hurt adoption or even lead to a
significant increase in lost merchandise, but I'm equally sure it will happen.

~~~
TulliusCicero
Sure a few will do it for fun. Most won't though, because it's still stealing
things and there'll be a non-trivial chance of getting caught.

------
jakozaur
Wow. So groceries without checkout.

I thought that at some point RFID would replace barcodes providing similar
experience. However, this system claim to be based on cameras and image
recognition.

~~~
notheguyouthink
I'm absolutely shocked big chains aren't doing this already. I hate the lines
at my local grocery, it's fucking annoying as hell, a terrible UX and everyone
always seems upset _(i try to be chill, fwiw.. for the cashier sake lol)_.

I sort of doubt i'll ever see these Amazon stores though, Brick and Mortar is
quite hard. I suspect i'll see someone (Amazon or otherwise) add this to the
big chains i already use, though.

Either way, lets get rid of lines please.

~~~
jerf
"I'm absolutely shocked big chains aren't doing this already."

They don't have the money. It's a very competitive business and margins are
not high enough to be doing that level of cutting-edge computer science
research.

I've seen them try just to build software that allows you to shop from home
and get it delivered either curbside or to your home. They can. But in my
opinion, it's also clearly at the limit of their capability, and with all due
respect to the programmers involved, also clearly just barely staffed
adequately.

------
mrcabada
This seems easy to outsmart or confuse.

What if I go with someone that doesn't have an Amazon Go account grabs some
stuff for me and throw it to me?

Or how about I go with someone that has an Amazon Go account too and we divide
in two, he goes for the milks I go for the cereals. We meet just before the
"check-out" and he gives me my milk I give him his cereal.

I'd need to know more about the technical stuff to know how it could be
confused, or to know if it's even possible to.

------
masthead
If there's an Amazon employee who has visited the store, please tell us the
experience.

------
jedberg
I suspect during the beta they've asked their employees to try and steal
things amd move things to the wrong place -- really push the software.

At least I hope they did. I assume they are going into this expecting a loss
while they work out the kinks.

~~~
dimino
Based on comments in here, one would suspect they implemented this entire
thing without trying to break it even once.

~~~
pwinnski
No company or government in the history of humanity has managed to foresee the
myriad ways dishonest people will try to get away with dishonest things. Many,
many, many, many, many companies have severely underestimated the high cost of
fraud.

Also, employees trying to break the system are not likely to bringing young
kids shopping with them.

The only question I have is who's liable when things are fuzzy: right now, the
store bears the liability for things eaten within the store, destroyed while
in the store, snuck out, etc. It's easy to see that this technology leads to
the liability being pushed onto the shopper for all of those cases, but that
will definitely lead to some serious customer-service arguments.

~~~
jedberg
Customers has always been liable for these things. It's only because of
customer service nightmares that they aren't. It's really not much different
except now they store has slightly better data.

------
CodeSheikh
Guys this is not good. As much as I love the convenience of pick-and-go, this
eventually will prove out to be drastic for a variety of bad socioeconomic
reasons, that most of us are already aware of. Small businesses were already
suffering at the hands of Amazon Prime. Now Amazon Go wants to not only kick
out those businesses out of the block but it also wants to take away jobs of
small retail salesperson. Unacceptable. This can perhaps work at Amazon
headquarters but I hope, I really hope it does not make its way to major metro
cities like NYC and if it does then Amazon should promise to create certain
number of jobs and revenue that it intends to displace. Just because an
average reader of HN does not do such jobs or had held such jobs for only a
brief period in his/her life, this does not mean that lot of people don't rely
on such small time jobs for their livelihood.

Places I can see this working are with low footprints such as cafes at
hospitals etc.

Amazon Go, please Go away.

Updated: Grammar correction.

~~~
steego
It's disappointing to see people downvote this post rather than respond to it.

I'm not going to argue that this sort of technology isn't going to have a
decimating effect on employment, small business etc. It will. It will very
likely have a huge socioeconomic impact for one simple reason: __Most of us
aren 't planning for the next industrial revolution. __

That fact that you 're freaking out now tells me you really haven't been
thinking deeply about the impact that automation is going to have on our
society, nor have you been considering _realistic_ solutions to these
potential problems.

Automation will decimate jobs as it allows us to create lot more with less. It
might give people more leisure time, or it might widen the income gap. We
could send people back to school to learn relevant skills, and we might be
able to do it cheaply if we maximized MOOCs and vocational training more and
relied less on expensive universities with lavish facilities and football
coaches with million dollar salaries.

We could also fuck up our opportunity to move forward by focusing our energy
on preserving jobs that we know are going away. It's not if, it's when.

Not moving forward is not a realistic option. Even if had all the political
power to get your way in this country, other countries will simply take the
lead in automation. The countries that focus on their energy on educating
their people to take on the next generation of jobs will be the economic
leaders of tomorrow.

It's not a small problem and it's not going to magically work itself out like
some laissez faire dipshits would like to tell you. This is going to be tough
and painful. Now is the time to start planning for our future.

~~~
Moshe_Silnorin
>Most of us aren't planning for the next industrial revolution.

The value of labour will continue to decline. While your labour has value,
saving up as much money as possible and putting it in index funds seems like a
really good idea.

------
oaktowner
Interesting that they say "Amazon Go is currently open to Amazon employees in
our Beta program, and will open to the public in early 2017."

Generally "beta" implies that non-employees are using it. This is more of a
dogfooding program (though maybe they wanted to avoid that term since they're
selling human food this way!).

~~~
flyt
Amazon in Seattle is a large enough org that they can "beta test" something
like this with 10k+ employees that don't work on anything related to it, and
get basically the same feedback as opening to the public.

------
microDude
Ok Amazon, why not do this?

Skip the whole stocked shelf thing entirely. Have a website setup that
customers can build a shopping cart, then just show up and pickup their "pre-
bagged" groceries. The benefits to this are obvious.

1) No shop lifting. 2) Car friendly (you could have multiple drive-thru pickup
lines) 3) Convenience for the shopper (saved lists, common items, don't have
to walk around the store) 4) The store, could just effectively be a warehouse.
5) Possible to automate almost all of the work.

And before you say "what about produce?". Well, you could have a automated
"imaging" station upon goods receipt that customers could use when building
their cart. Or, offer really good return policies. Either way, the convenience
would far outweigh the produce problem.

~~~
Consultant32452
They're 90% of the way there with primenow. You can order frozen chicken, deli
meats, etc. No fresh fruits and veggies yet, but you can order eggs. There's
no drive-thru though, they just deliver it to your house within 2 hours of
ordering, 1 hour if you pay a premium.

------
jonlucc
It already feels very weird to me to walk into an Apple store, check out on my
own phone, and just walk out with product. This will take some getting used
to.

~~~
ksec
I think it works for grocery, but for luxury products I do expect someone to
do some basic checkout.

------
lsiebert
I think this potentially ignores the needs of disabled shoppers who rely on
supermarket workers.

What if you have mobility issues and need someone to grab items for you? What
if you have vision issues and need someone to read an ingredient list?

~~~
spuz
There will still be staff. Amazon were obviously careful to include a shelf
stockist in the promotional video. Staff will still be needed to stock shelves
and solve problems with the automation systems and most likely, to answer
customer questions and help customers with their needs.

------
SonicSoul
I think this could work if cart or your app confirms your selection before
checkout. Otherwise people would be too stressed out / unsure about discounted
items to roll the dice.

------
kowdermeister
RFID alone is not enough. It must have some kind of video tracking component
to it, otherwise I could easily fabricate a Faraday cage inside my bag and
just leave with the goods.

------
dmvaldman
Why is this a machine learning problem? Why not use some low-power tag for
items, and scan all items on customer exit?

Personal opinion: Amazon is not interested in creating supermarkets/wal-marts.
Instead it wants to sell an ML solution to other brick & mortar stores, and
this current effort is to prove plausibility. Selling an ML solution, with
cameras and software, is harder to compete with than a tagging solution
(especially if based on open and accessible hardware).

~~~
rtkwe
You're basically describing the old idea of 'tag everything with RFID' for the
checkoutless grocery store. It didn't really catch on because it's a fairly
expensive way to attack the problem given the small margins on most items and
would require that EVERY manufacturer implement the tags or for the
stores/distribution system to add tags to non compliant items which would also
be fairly expensive.

So to get around needing to tag everything you can throw computer vision and
machine learning at the problem to determine where the person is grabbing an
item from and combined with well organized shelves you now know what they just
grabbed off the shelves.

------
Keverw
I love this idea! I hate how stores only have like 1 or 2 registers opened.

I wonder how it would react to a family shopping, is it tracking people or the
bag? Hopefully it'd bill who ever has the bag in case your kid puts in a bunch
of junk food. Supporting carts for larger purchases seems like somthing is
missing.

But yeah I love this. I hope we move towards the future when repetitive jobs
are all automated and we have some sort of basic income. So the human race can
be more innovative and everyone can unlock their true potential instead of
being a corporate drones for a job they never liked and can't figure out how
to get out of it.

Edit: Wanted to add real quick - as things do get more automated. I do hope
there's a easy way to get ahold of human in case of things acting up or if you
just need some help. I know tons of sites seem to not even provide support or
make it super hard to even find a contact. Amazon itself seems to have good
support from what I've heard, never really had to use it but in general
companies should focus on support also, with or without automation. Just seems
like somthing generally lacking to me in the tech industry.

------
jaypaulynice
I'm guessing it's not as simple as they make it look in the video...unless the
food tags have some kind of RFID/Bluetooth to communicate with the phone in
your pocket...maybe the grocery bags? Even with cashiers sometimes they don't
know what the price is...also some things are sold by the pounds...where is
the scale? What if you pay then walk back in again? You get double charged?

~~~
rtkwe
No need for them to talk to your phone or a smart bag. They just funnel you
out through a lane and scan them there if they're using RFID. They can also do
this theoretically without using RFID at all if they can solidly determine
what product you're taking off the shelf, maybe by using good cameras to see
where you're reaching and if you're placing or replacing the item that's
assigned to that slot. They've been tracking you since you entered the store
so they know what Amazon account each person is associated with so they just
combine the 2.

As for loose weighed items it doesn't look like they're selling those.
/Everything/ in the promo shot of the store is already packaged and they look
like they're going for more of a convenience store food source than a
traditional grocery store.

~~~
jaypaulynice
It would take many cameras working together to pull this off...what happens
when you drop out of sight? Feels like a big vending machine...If they're not
competing with big grocery stores, then this won't scale well...right?

~~~
rtkwe
If the system relies on tracking you constantly from the moment you enter
they'll have as many cameras as they need to cover the whole store. For just
tracking the person you really don't need too high of detail just decent
coverage and if the system is using CV to determine what you're taking off the
shelves instead of RFID(ish) tags (which makes sense given the cost of
applying tags to every item) then they've already got way better camera
coverage than they need to just track you around the store.

Really this whole thread is all just rank speculation that'll be mostly
confirmed or denied once a store actually opens and people can look around and
see what's going on.

Also as for scaling it's a fixed cost to cover a larger area compared with a
variable cost if they're using RFID to scan when you pass through the
turnstiles so really a camera based system probably scales better than a tag
based system.

------
Sir_Cmpwn
I only run open source software on my phone. I can't wait for the day when I
can't even buy groceries without a proprietary app.

------
superuser2
The futuristic supermarket I imagined as a kid was a warehouse-scale vending
machine. Robotic carts roll down the aisles on tracks, and the shelves push
the requested items out onto them. You show up after that's done and collect
your cart.

Probably need some human labor for the produce section.

This is interesting but the checkout line is nothing compared to the time in
the aisles.

------
vit05
What I do not understand is: Why do they need to know that it was me who got
something off the shelf? They need to know when something has left the shelf,
so they can refuel, and they need to know when something leaves the store, so
they can charge.

But do they really need to know when you pull out an item and then give up
buying it?

~~~
rtkwe
It's kind of the only way to do it without having an RFID tag on everything
which would be expensive because they'd have to either special order the items
from the manufacturer or apply them themselves both of which are costly.
That's one of the major sticking points that has prevented this from showing
up in normal grocery stores for years.

~~~
vit05
I read a bit more about, it seems that following the whole process, not just
check in and check out, it becomes harder to steal an item.

"Because it works by watching actual items come off the shelves — instead of
reading a tag or RFID chip, for example — you won’t be able to steal items by
removing or altering tags."

------
edkennedy
What I like about this is it encourages the European style of grocery
shopping. That is, visiting a grocery store daily to make dinner with fresher
foods. The longer the lines, wait, and commute, the larger grocery orders will
get and the further people are pushed towards Costco style grocery purchasing.

------
ocdtrekkie
My first thought is: I don't have a supported smartphone.

The current checkout process entails the acceptance of common legal tender,
but this process will require I have their app, and presumably allow it quite
a bit of tracking permission.

A cool demo, sure, but I think I'll stick to shopping like the normal folks.

~~~
gdulli
If there's two things I get uneasy about, it's (1) giving up privacy in a
whole new category of being filmed/monitored/tracked and (2) being guided into
behaviors that encourage me to consume more and consume more casually.

~~~
giarc
If you've ever entered a grocery store, both of those things have already
happened.

~~~
gdulli
It's imperfect and unable to be completely avoided, but worse to move the line
further in the wrong direction.

------
Blue3Wheeler
I think this technology is something our society doesn't need in this moment.
Reducing jobs only because people can't wait in the line is not a big step to
humanity. We need to see what are the consequences for future generations
instead of trying to look "futuristic".

~~~
darpa_escapee
Get ready to be called a Luddite for thinking about the consequences of
embracing the new shiny without question.

------
Roritharr
Interesting, i've read about these Store Concepts for years as Test Projects
from Rewe in Germany, but they never rolled them out widely. Probably sticking
RFID on everything was too expensive. This camera based solution might be
better suited for a wide rollout.

~~~
pimeys
I remember having a discussion with a developer doing these RFID based
solutions. He said one tag was back in those days about 10-15 cents each,
which is way too much for supermarkets.

Talking about Rewe and German supermarkets, it's unbelievable how horrible the
whole experience of doing grocery shopping is here in Germany. You almost
always need to queue a lot, there is no space to pack your groceries and the
cashier don't give you any time to pack until pushing the next customer's
groceries to the small space.

They try to be efficient here, but the reality is quite chaotic.

~~~
DominikPeters
If you're talking about discount supermarkets (Aldi, Lidl, etc), then note
you're not supposed to pack your groceries at the cashier, but rather put them
back into your shopping cart and pack up by the packing tables behind the
cashiers. This way, checkout proceeds much faster compared to almost all other
countries.

~~~
pimeys
Also Rewe and Real enforce this behavior. And I don't see anybody doing this.
The next customer's groceries are mixed up with yours and everybody seems to
be ok with that.

------
highprofit
This is impressive. How did it know which products were inside the woman's
shopping bag? As customer grabs items how does it associate the items to that
customer's virtual cart instantly? Aren't customers supposed to scan the
products?

------
pjc50
So it's a surveillance scheme good enough to track every product on every
shelf?

------
rad_gruchalski
"Four years ago we asked ourselves: what if we could create a shopping
experience with no lines and no checkout?"

And yet they're not first doing this:
[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3465767/Now-s...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3465767/Now-
s-self-service-24-hour-unmanned-shop-Sweden-lets-shoppers-unlock-doors-scan-
items-pay-using-just-app.html)

------
hourislate
I like to take my time shopping. Look around read labels, check what are
people are buying.

The part that kills me is checking out. I have always wondered why the cart
can't scan your items and when you push it through a reader at checkout it
just has everything totaled and charges you. The cashier can now bag your
groceries. You could even have the cart recheck your purchase amount when the
items are removed to be packed.

Someone out there hurry up and figure out the details :)

------
throw7
This is bad. I can't really support this because it requires a smartphone. And
it literally looks like you must have the Amazon Go app to enter the store.
No.

------
bluelu
Maybe they also weight you when enter and leave the store. They can then cross
check your weight with the weight of the items you have bought.

~~~
giarc
I can't tell if your comment is tongue in cheek or not, but I highly doubt
they will make people weigh themselves when they walk in. If they aren't
confident in their image recognition technology they would improve it rather
than throw in an additional method of tracking.

~~~
bluelu
I'm pretty sure you can weight persons when they pass the entrance and exit
automatically, by adding sensors to the floor.

------
sndean
Other interesting possible implications of this:

1) The inability to pay with cash (or debit, or check, etc..). 2) No need to
carry any form of money in the store.

Taken to an extreme where every store runs this way, will people have a need
for cash, credit cards, or anything else? Why not just have your bank account
attached to your Amazon (and every other account) and have money taken out
directly?

~~~
Neliquat
As a security guy, that is terrifying.

------
xaduha
Supermarket retail has razor thin margins, last I heard. If it's going to save
money in the long run, then it's the future.

------
glup
If the justification for merging the produce stand, bakery, fishmonger,
butcher, etc. into one is the efficiency of a shared POS and delivery system,
this could provide the justification for splitting them back out, at least in
upscale markets. Rather than cashiers, you would have "consultants." And you
get richer data for supply chain decisions.

------
agentgt
I know this is fairly impossible in urban areas but I find myself shopping
much more frequently in what I call grocery farms. If you live in affluent
suburbias I'm sure you have seen them. They are basically high end grocery
stores that sells the produce they grow along with other things they buy from
other _local_ farms. Some of the produce is grown inside and seasonal things
are grown outside.

Yeah some of them are just for show and an excuse to sell high end stonewall
kitchen stuff but others actually grow their own stuff or sell other farms
stuff.

The problem with local food (produce and meat) is that they are often not in
plastic containers (which I prefer). It looks like Amazon Go requires very
prepackaged stuff.

I really would love to see someway to have more farm+grocery stores (that is
grow right in the store or very near by). Figuring out a way (even if it
requires some GMO) to grow food right in the store would be an amazing thing
for the environment, health, and food quality.

The other things is I know people are in a rush with everything but over the
last few years I find grocery shopping rather cathartic and I think people
used to enjoy grocery shopping (you know go to the butcher and then to the
baker kind of european lifestyle). It is shame we have to make something even
more "on the go" that I'm not sure needs to be.

~~~
heliumcraft
> (even if it requires some GMO)

You say that like if it's a bad thing, you might want to better inform
yourself on GMOs as there are A LOT of myths and misconceptions out there.

~~~
agentgt
> You say that like if it's a bad thing, you might want to better inform
> yourself on GMOs as there are A LOT of myths and misconceptions out there.

And you might not want to assume what I know and don't :)

I say it because GMOs are not open source. Local farms don't get access to
GMOs and it can create an unfair advantage to big farms.

As for health reasons I don't believe that GMOs are bad for you but they may
have lower nutrients since you can now grow on the same plot of land over and
over (and soil depletion of nutrients is a real thing) [1].

I'll assume you didn't know about soil depletion... _as there are lot of
people that don 't and you know its better to inform yourself_ :)

That being said I do agree that GMOs get mostly unfair sentiment.

[1]: [https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-depletion-
an...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-depletion-and-
nutrition-loss/)

~~~
heliumcraft
95% of seeds are patented, GMO or not, including those used in Organic
Farming, the 'open source' / patents part is not something specific to GMOs
(although the Organic industry works really hard to spread that myth).

Organic farming can also use pesticides (and most do), some of these
pesticides are as bad or even worse than the ones used in modern agriculture.

And in regards to nutrients [https://gmoanswers.com/studies/how-do-gm-crops-
impact-soil-h...](https://gmoanswers.com/studies/how-do-gm-crops-impact-soil-
health)

~~~
agentgt
I'm exceedingly open minded that GMOs are good but you might very well be
closed minded that there are some negatives particularly since I linked to a
scientific article (albeit slightly pop sci journal) and you gave me link to
an organization whos goal it is to spread GMOs are good.

From the SA article:

 _“Efforts to breed new varieties of crops that provide greater yield, pest
resistance and climate adaptability have allowed crops to grow bigger and more
rapidly,” reported Davis, “but their ability to manufacture or uptake
nutrients has not kept pace with their rapid growth.” There have likely been
declines in other nutrients, too, he said, such as magnesium, zinc and
vitamins B-6 and E, but they were not studied in 1950 and more research is
needed to find out how much less we are getting of these key vitamins and
minerals._

That doesn't mean GMOs are bad but it might mean people will abuse the fact
they will grow easily on just about anything (I'm exaggerating for emphasis).

As for the unfair advantage it is in large part because of ignorance of the
consumers. I admit it is a weak argument but sadly the local farmers often
have to grow non-gmo because that is what sells and they will get lower crop
yield if there are other nearby GMOs (bugs and cross pollination). It is not
enough to be locally grown... you have to be GMO free. I met a farmer in
Hawaii Kauai that shared this issue with me and the seemed fairly passionate
about it.

------
koolba
How do they know you're you? Do you scan your phone on the way in / out and
get tracked via RFID or do they do facial recognition?

If it's the latter there's no way I'd use something like this. I love Amazon
(as a retail customer) and AWS, but no way I'm self registering my face with
them.

------
mrfusion
This is really exciting. I've always wanted to see this.

It makes me wonder someday if money will be completely invisible.

------
shaydoc
Seriously, this will basically make lots of low skill workers redundant. Yes
it fabulous innovation, but surely automation along these lines is dangerous
for the fabric of society. When I say this, I mean, whats the plan for dealing
with all the lay offs caused by tech automation ?

------
8draco8
Looks cool but one major question:

Who can go in to the store? If only people that have phone + app then
technically I can't go in with my wife, allow her to pick and choose her
yogurt while I'm looking for a coffee, put our groceries in to one bag and pay
for it from my account.

------
zouhair
Nice and all but I don't want a store to get my personal info just so I can
shop at their place.

------
31reasons
Amazon "All Store Jobs" Go! Not sure how new administration going to respond
to this.

------
xs
If I bring the whole family shopping with me, does everyone need a phone app
and stuff?

------
learned
I got excited when I thought this would be about Go usage on AWS, but this is
way cooler.

------
mholmes680
I would have liked to be in the scrum meeting, and proposed the David Blaine
use-case.

------
yalogin
This is what people expected when RFID technology came up. They somehow
thought its going to be this panacea but quickly realized its not. Amazon
might have the solution but I can't say unless I see the implementation.

------
deusofnull
What happens if someone sneaks into the store without an amazon account and
walks right the hell out with whatever they want? Not a criticism, just
curious what we speculate the theft prevention systems used here might be.

~~~
ncallaway
> What happens if someone sneaks into the store without an amazon account and
> walks right the hell out with whatever they want?

This is also a perennial concern at any tradition grocery store as well.
Presumably, in a system that operates primary off of computer vision, you
would:

A) Be able to quickly detect an unrecognized person in the store and alert
security, and

B) Have very good video evidence of the person committing the shop-lifting to
provide to police.

It sounds like they actually end up in a better position relative to a
tradition grocery store from a security perspective.

~~~
deckar01
"On the charges of shoplifting from Amazon Go, you have been found guilty. You
are hereby sentenced to 3 years of Amazon Prime membership."

------
carrja99
Oh lame I was expecting this to be an announcement of Go support on AWS
Lambda.

------
kristofferR
It's really weird that the prices are printed on paper labels. Why aren't they
digital?

I guess it's not that big of an issue though, since this is a single store and
not a chain. The employees need stuff to do.

~~~
VLM
There was/is an old scam where the store puts up a tag with a false low price
and the UPC barcode scanner reports a different (higher of course) price and
much like long distance cramming hope the customer doesn't notice.

If the store is falsely accused its simple to hold the receipt up against the
paper label.

There are digital price labels but they're unidirectional protocol so every
time a product comes off sale the store risks substantial trouble if the
digital update protocol is merely 99.9% successful.

You'd need a successful bidirectional verifiable digital price tag system. It
could be as simple as sweeping a very high resolution camera up and down the
aisles.

------
sytelus
Amazon app currently already has barcode scanning. My guess is that they are
replacing POS with app. If you think about it no one needs those arcane point
of sell machines because smartphones can do scanning as well as payment
processing. The only thing left is detecting unscanned items which is fairly
well solved problem using RFIDs. May be later can be combined as well with
measuring weight of person identified when entering.

This is brilliant as-in how no one else thought about it. Lot of small shops
have limit on their open schedule because of staffing issues. I am assuming
Amazon will set up few experimental shops and then sell technology to other
stores. This can certainly revolutionize retail if they persist on executing
right.

------
samstave
So...

What if I have a large shopping run, like for Thanksgiving? I have a ~$400
cart worth of loot. Where will I sort and bag my goods?

They should make Amazon Go like a 7-11 rather than a Whole Foods.

Are the item prices any less?

------
nether
That dreadful music...
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11286858](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11286858)

------
richartruddie
I embrace and trust all that Amazon does. As Jeff Bezos is proud of saying
(not direct quote): you're not failing you're not trying enough difficult
things.

------
tmnvix
If I enter the store with a product I purchased elsewhere or even earlier in
the same store (say some bottled water), will I be charged for it when I
leave?

------
warrenmiller
The future is now! This advert 10 years ago:
[https://youtu.be/pmAr23yZP9Y](https://youtu.be/pmAr23yZP9Y)

------
bhewes
I can see this being useful by freeing up staff to provide value added
services instead of being stuck at the register. I can see stores having
category experts.

------
celticninja
im not sure this is a problem that needed to be solved. The issue of ordering
groceries has been solved by existing supermarkets, in my case i can order
everything I need on a weekly basis from Tesco for a small delivery fee. The
last thing i want to do is go back to shopping in store, there are smaller
local shops for little items but i cant see me using Amazon go in lieu of my
existing grocery store that delivers.

------
estrabd
"Alert, alert you are too poor to be in here."

------
ISNIT
"No lines" I'm just imagining a huge group of people standing by the door
waiting to download the app so they can buy eggs.

------
losteverything
The packaging or company that creates products conducive to "go" (cashierless)
will be required for chains like walmart.

------
mooveprince
This is cool. Interested to know how customers can return their product once
they come out of the store. Just place it back ?

------
richartruddie
This is the future of the world. Great innovation that we're excited to see.
Whats not to love about this?

------
malditojavi
Now the question is: would Bezos keep this tech for himself or give access to
it to other big retailers?

------
kreisel93
Will be useful in Amazon package centers for pickers

------
jefe_
amazon go skydive - just hop on the plane!

amazon go swim - just dive right in!

amazon go kennels - just drop and drive!

amazon go restoration hardware - good luck!

amazon go lite - just grab and checkout and go!

amazon go guns - just grab and go!

i assume they will eventually open this up to other retailers / service
providers?

------
rmurthy
What happens if my smartphone is switched off after I enter the retail
warehouse?

------
hellbanner
Does it use a phone app & GPS/NFC for knowing when to charge the customer?

------
acomar
I wonder how they plan to deal with fraud... some kind of check-in process
instead?

~~~
viktorelofsson
> With our Just Walk Out Shopping experience, simply use the Amazon Go app to
> enter the store, take the products you want, and go! No lines, no checkout.
> (No, seriously.)

Yes, seems like you check-in with an app.

~~~
acomar
I saw that, but it sounds vague enough that there a few different scenarios I
can think of to attack this service. Like what are they going to do if
multiple people are sharing an account, but they only have photos of one?

edit: I just realized how they can deal with that -- take a picture when the
person walks in and tie it to the account they scanned. There still seem to be
a bunch of fraud issues, but this is certainly interesting.

~~~
dandr01d
They don't need to remember photos at all. Just track the person beginning at
the point of scan.

------
dingdongding
How does this scale. Would camera be able to follow 100 people at the same
time?

------
smcg
So how long before someone starts claiming this is the mark of the beast?

------
throwaway77127
If the merchandise is as bad as the books they ship (faded pages, water
damage, ..), no thanks.

I don't need Deep Learning[tm] when I go to a supermarket. Also, they should
really have integrated The Blockchain[tm] in the buzzwords.

Nevertheless, this is good for Bitcoin.

------
junke
A lot safer than the "Just Run Out" low-tech approach.

------
Blue3Wheeler
This encourages consumerism. It will be hard to take a count of what you're
spending. While I wait in the line I always rethink about what I'm buying,
sometimes I realize I'm buying something I don't need.

~~~
pshc
Amazon hates consumerism.

------
anacleto
Software is eating the world and Amazon is eating software.

------
josephby
Why announce this 3 months ahead of the scheduled opening?

------
sevmardi
Someone cares to explain the technology behind this?

~~~
dandr01d
1\. Scan your personal barcode with your phone when you walk in. Camera
associates your physical self with your code.

2\. Cameras track every item you pick up.

3\. Cameras note when you leave the store and charge you.

~~~
ajeet_dhaliwal
Do you know this for sure or is it a guess? I was wondering if it might be
your phone proximity to the items for a period of time but I guess that would
be easy to tamper with.

------
alvil
I'm going to be depressed. Stamped Sheeps.

------
retube
why is "deep learning" and "computer vision" required here? Surely a RFID tag
on each item would suffice?

~~~
LeanderK
RFID tags are way to expensive to scale. The margin for one of the products
might be just a few cents, so with RFID tags they might have to sell at a loss
or rise prices. This would eliminate the cashier, but at least in germany the
wage/item scanned is way cheaper then RFID tags.

------
ta11ey
1 million Merits.

------
lexap
Selfycart's valuation just skyrocketed.

------
edward
How does Amazon Go handle alcohol sales?

------
HillaryBriss
I like the video. But I wonder where they put all the middle aged and elderly
customers. Probably in the food.

~~~
elicash
There are zero children in the video, as well.

~~~
Grue3
I don't think there are many children (or elderly for that matter) among
Amazon employees.

~~~
HillaryBriss
Yes. Not any more.

------
thesimpsons1022
this is great! since the election my one purpose in life has been to automate
every job of the "white working class" because of what they've decided to do
to us. With this and Otto and Uber it won't be long.

------
estrabd
What Would Glenda Do?

------
kreisel93
communism is on the way and everyone is happy :)

~~~
234dd57d2c8db
Sweet, can't wait to be put in a forced labor camp. Wonder how many millions
will die this time.

~~~
kreisel93
or Kuomintang
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_camp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_camp)

------
cwkoss
Can I wear a Jeff Bezos mask into the store to get free groceries?

------
kesor
About time.

------
vlunkr
As someone who regularly takes kids to the grocery store, this would be a
nightmare. You'd get charged for every random thing your kid decided to pull
off a shelf and stuff somewhere else. Unless their AI ignores kids or
something.

------
clifanatic
So, you drive around trying to catch Amazons on your phone?

------
pierre_d528

                           1984 anyone?

~~~
redsummer
What a grim and desolate idea.

------
colept
Shut up and take my money.

~~~
alfanhui
Please just exit the store, we don't take cash here.

~~~
Johnie
You joke, but when I was in Beijing a couple of months ago, the juice vendor
wouldn't take cash from me. She only accepted AliPay and WeChat.

~~~
mrkevinlui
Yup, mobile payment is so seamless in China

