goofyfish
01-29-02, 08:36 AM
Neat idea, or soulless civilization destroyer?
I wonder if it's really a good idea to introduce something that lets us have even less contact with fellow humans than modern society already allows, turning the supermarket into an automat straight out of a Hopper painting. I'd call it yet another step down a path we've walked for half a century.
Before there were supermarkets, people didn't have aisles to roam, collecting their groceries. Instead, they'd go to the store counter, and tell the person working there what items they'd want, who would then go and collect them, bag them, and ring them up. With the advent of supermarkets, the company had a much smaller workforce overhead to pay. The customer would then collect their own items, have a greater selection of items they could buy, and still pay less than before. They'd then take their items forward to be rung up and bagged. It was a big win, and the new mode pretty much pushed out all of the mom-and-pop markets. Later on, some supermarkets even got rid of baggers, in order to further reduce their costs. But others retained their baggers, because some people were willing to pay a bit more for their groceries for the added convenience.
Now, with checkout scanner technology sufficiently advanced, some supermarkets are trying to reduce overhead yet again. And the ability or requirement for human interaction is again reduced. I ache at the cold feeling I get when I consider the shape this society will be in if we continue with trends such as this.
Peace.
I wonder if it's really a good idea to introduce something that lets us have even less contact with fellow humans than modern society already allows, turning the supermarket into an automat straight out of a Hopper painting. I'd call it yet another step down a path we've walked for half a century.
Before there were supermarkets, people didn't have aisles to roam, collecting their groceries. Instead, they'd go to the store counter, and tell the person working there what items they'd want, who would then go and collect them, bag them, and ring them up. With the advent of supermarkets, the company had a much smaller workforce overhead to pay. The customer would then collect their own items, have a greater selection of items they could buy, and still pay less than before. They'd then take their items forward to be rung up and bagged. It was a big win, and the new mode pretty much pushed out all of the mom-and-pop markets. Later on, some supermarkets even got rid of baggers, in order to further reduce their costs. But others retained their baggers, because some people were willing to pay a bit more for their groceries for the added convenience.
Now, with checkout scanner technology sufficiently advanced, some supermarkets are trying to reduce overhead yet again. And the ability or requirement for human interaction is again reduced. I ache at the cold feeling I get when I consider the shape this society will be in if we continue with trends such as this.
Peace.