App pays users to line up outside new restaurants | Hacker News Reader

App pays users to line up outside new restaurants

washingtonpost.com

125 pointsmhb108 comments

Buying a crowd is old school. Politicians and unions have been renting mobs of protesters since at least the 90's, when I first became aware of it. Probably longer. The only thing new here is getting the gig through an app instead of a flyer on a telephone pole.

Politicians and unions have been renting mobs of protesters since there were politicians and unions

Then I guess this market is ripe for disruption: aka a boring CRUD app that eliminates paper and increases network visibility.

Polticians rented crowds back in the days of Athens and Rome

If you mean the BC 1090s that is.

Or in the arts, the claque: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claque

"Although the practice mostly died out in Europe during the mid-20th century, it has continued in Russia, most famously with the Bolshoi Ballet,[4] and US presidential speaking engagements.[5][6]"

I'm dissatisfied the news never investigates the veracity of the crowd. It certainly is misleading. But I suppose pomp and circumstance helps the media inflate perceptions of the events they cover.

If these companies provided information more expensive than the advertising they sell, they would lose money. How many allergy and car ads does airtime cost for the reporter to talk to 10 people?

Have companies been doing this too?

Lining up outside a new restaurant is probably safer than participating in a protest or strike.

http://www.crowdsforrent.com/

edit: I'm no way related to that company. It's just an example. Here's more

https://crowdsondemand.com/

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/07/crowd-h...

>They’ve even been hand-picked by a casting agent of sorts, an algorithmic one that selects each person according to age, location, style and Facebook “likes.”

>They may look excited, but that could also be part of the production. Acting disengaged while they idle in line could tarnish their “reputation score,” an identifier that influences whether they’ll be “cast” again.

Oh boy, it's happening! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive

That's a good episode but I don't see how it's relevant here. They're workers and the manager has a system in place to track their performance. Same thing has been around since ancient times, although not so formalized. When a system like that is in place for non-workers and you use it for friends and family is when we can start comparing the situation to Nosedive with a straight face.

Off topic, but man, I feel like the "Black Mirror" series is required viewing for anybody working in technology. Depressing yes, but also a good warning of what is coming.

A lot of it's an observation of where we already are, not a warning about what's coming.

[EDIT] in fact I'd class a solid 4 of the first 6 episodes as mostly about general human nature, or about where the interaction of technology/society is currently at. The new season's (well, also the Christmas special) kind of a departure in that it's latched more firmly onto the warnings about the future and Twilight Zone-ish aspects of the series, which had previously been more subdued. Be Right Back and The Entire History of You are the ones from the first 6 that I'd class as mostly about what future technology might do to us, though I'd be open to arguments against that classification for Entire History, certainly—I'd have to re-watch it to be sure, but my recollection of it is that it's only marginally in that category.

I wouldn't view it like a warning so much as a reconition of our fears for the future. Few of the techs discussed would be easy sells for people.

Hopefully it stays in China.

"warning?!" Many people would aspire to run companies that build cool stuff like they have! ;)

If you liked that story, you might also like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Down_and_Out_in_the_Magic_King... , which explored some of the same themes.

It's one of those stories where I'm glad I saw it, but the experience was pretty uncomfortable. I've seen a few of the other Black Mirror episodes but not all of them yet, because I've got to be in that right state of mind to steel myself against it.

Kinda masochistic!

Thanks for the recommendation, I'll try and remember that one next time I've got the groove.

Actually, I remember hearing a lot about 'social credit ratings' in China a few years ago. I just took a look and it seems like the Chinese government is taking a step back on it. https://www.ft.com/content/f772a9ce-60c4-11e7-91a7-502f7ee26...

The logical next step here is to write an app that lets you sell your place in line at a trendy restaurant. Take 50%.

There is a natural base of sellers (the people who are waiting in line) and buyers (assuming that paying people to wait in line actually works at creating demand).

Something like this business has been manually tested -- see https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/creativityrulz/200908/t... :

> One group identified a problem common in a lot of college towns—the frustratingly long lines at popular restaurants on Saturday night. The team decided to help those people who didn’t want to wait in line. They paired off and booked reservations at several restaurants. As the times for their reservations approached, they sold each reservation for up to twenty dollars to customers who were happy to avoid a long wait. As the evening wore on, they made several interesting observations. First, they realized that the female students were better at selling the reservations than the male students, probably because customers were more comfortable being approached by the young women. They adjusted their plan so that the male students ran around town making reservations at different restaurants while the female students sold those places in line. They also learned that the entire operation worked best at restaurants that use vibrating pagers to alert customers when their table is ready. Physically swapping pagers made customers feel as though they were receiving something tangible for their money. They were more comfortable handing over their money and pager in exchange for the new pager. This had an additional bonus—teams could then sell the newly acquired pager as the later reservation time grew nearer.

It would be easy to do business development -- you could just target the app at exactly the same restaurants who are using Surkus. Everyone wins.

This is actually common practice in China. You pay people to wait for you in queues. However, there is a more sinister side to that as well. Highly demanded and free spots are grabbed early and then ransomed for money. This happens for example in Apple store Genius Bar appointments. Basically the same problem as with concert tickets.

This quote is part of a book [1] that has more stories. IIRC the author teaches entrepreneurship at Stanford.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/What-Wish-Knew-When-Was/dp/0061735191

What I don't get is that there is nothing that puts me off going to a bar or restaurant more than a long queue. And if I know of a place that systematically has a line in front, that's the one place I won't even consider.

I used to work as a DJ and club promoter and we worked our asses off to make sure there was a line when we opened. Whatever we could do to get people to show up, which was mostly free admission and free drinks. If you don't have a line when you open, people will just walk in, hang out for a few minutes and leave. And your whole party is dead. Clubs don't give you a second chance if that happens.

When you're throwing a party, the product is not the music or the drink specials, it's the crowd. If the crowd isn't there, you have nothing to sell.

Years ago I remember walking past a club in a very busy party of town at like 10pm. There was a huge queue of people. My friend said, "Let's go there!" Surprised, I asked why. "It must be really good, look at that queue!"

It really does happen.

But yep, like yourself, if there's a queue I have zero interest. I put it down to impatience and disliking noisy crowds in general.

Maybe extroverts are drawn to queues?? Too simplistic, I'm sure.

My dislike of queues has to do with my own comfort. I can queue to receive money. But I am not going to queue to spend money somewhere!

I travel internationally a lot, and the best single indicator of a quality restaurant is a packed house.

San Francisco: "If there's no line outside then don't go there"

I really don't get the whole wait outside for 35 minutes to get marginally better ice cream thing. I feel like people want the tweetbrags about visiting the trendy ice cream shop more than they want the ice cream.

If you are talking about Bi-Rite creamery near Dolores Park, I feel you, but hear me out.

Three things:

1. I fucking despise lines. I will pay money, I will forgo comfort, I will give up on a thing I want, if a Line is an obstacle. I'm the jabroni paying VIP entrance to clubs not because I want to be cool, but because I can't be fucked to stand in a line. I won't do it. I'll go hungry before I stand in a line. I bought a motorcycle so I could skip car lines.

2. I'm a food snob.

3. I've traveled a lot. Combined with (2) this means I eat as much as I can all over the world because I have a passion for food and I want to eat the best before I die.

Bearing those things in mind, know this: Bi-Rite creamery is the best ice cream I have ever had in my life, and I will stand in line for an hour for it. It is worth the line and my god there are few things in life I will say that about.

EDIT: By the way protip, you can skip the line if you get a pint. So... I kind of cheat now, when I go I just buy like 5 pints of different flavors :P

Bi-Rite is convenient to Dolores Park, but the product is very unexceptional in SF in 2017. Like almost all the other boutique shops, they're not a state-certified pasteurizer, so they're legally required to buy "ice cream base" from one; they use Straus, like most high-end shops in the Bay:

https://missionlocal.org/2015/06/san-francisco-ice-cream-is-...

http://strausfamilycreamery.com/products/item/organic-wholes...

Because of the pasteurization requirement, you can't legally buy the best ice cream in the world in California -- compare the taste of Straus milk to milk straight out of a cow.

Other SF shops have much more creative flavors these days, if that's more your thing.

OK, this comment deserves a Black Mirror episode all its own, or at least a skit in Portlandia, and I don't mind taking the karma nosedive that will result from pointing that out.

I remember back in the day when Mitchell's on 29th was the place to go for ice cream. It was not trendy, but it was popular. And depending on the weather, you'd have to wait in a line out and around the corner.

They're not "special" but they do have some interesting flavors which are regular flavors in other parts of the world (mung bean or mango, etc) rather than going for "unique/experimental" flavors.

Mostly it was regular blue collar SF. Not trendseeking foodsnobs.

I miss the days when food was food and people didn't compete over being trendier than thou.

There are a few ways to look at it -- one way is hipster trendseeking, another way is nerding out about food. If that's not your thing, fine, but it's fair to expect some nerding on HN. :-)

I'm with you on lines. Fuck that, there's always better things to be doing. But you can skip the bi-rite lines if you just go at a non-weekend day. Tuesday mid-day? No lines!

Also Ice Cream Bar has better stuff. Fight me! :P

I will actually fight you over this

But yup, my GF and I actually took a day off work on a Tuesday specifically for bi-rite. Made the trip up all the way from South Bay. Worth.

Isn't it too melty for you? I think the taste is okay but I'd take Mitchell's or Smitten over Bi-Rite any day.

Following the theme of the article, how much did Bi-Rite pay you to post this?

If I had the option of being paid by Bi-Rite I would take the payment in the form of ice cream, and thus wouldn't have any stories to relate of standing in line with the plebes ;)

Make sure you check out Salt and Straw - new in town from Portland, the best ice cream I've had and unique flavors that change monthly.

see, I think Bi-rite is mediocre at best. I prefer Humphrey Slocombe. also available in some flavours at he Exploratorium. But lines, or queues, are annoying. But I'll use them to learn some Zen.

Have you guys tried Mr and Mrs Misscellenaous ?

This thread has become comically meta

+1 - San Franciscans love to wait in line. EDIT: getting downvotes, not saying all of SF, but its definitely a "thing" - if you live here you've seen it

I've come to believe that San Franciscans love pain and inconvenience.

Explaining why they moved to San Francisco in the first place?

I recently moved here, I am not experiencing pain. Inconvenience is strictly in the eye of the beholder.

I moved to SF to continue a relationship with a woman who was in residency for pyschiatry at Standford.

I didn't know it at the time but this was the exact reason I moved to SF.

It's the only explanation.

Really? I occasionally see lines for lunch, but that's more of a rush thing. Where do you see this?

Bi-Rite, Tartine, Mama's, Bob's, San Tung, Tpumps, Mensho Ramen. It is a weird manifestation of SF group; many of those places aren't even that good. Peninsula and South Bay aren't much better, mediocre ramen places in particular draw huge lines (Santa Ramen, Santa Ramen, and especially average: Orenchi).

http://sanfranciscowaits.tumblr.com/

Having lived in both places, I honestly think NYC is worse. New Yorkers love waiting on lines, and every single week feels like a new stupid craze that people are standing on line for. I always like to just wait three months and then check it out. The hordes have moved on and the kinks have been worked out.

San Francisco: "If it's not sold out, why even buy a ticket"

To be fair, I have yet to have good brunch at a restaurant where there was no wait on a Saturday or Sunday morning. When there are more people who want brunch than there are places offering brunch, you'd posit that places without a wait don't have good brunch.

There's like a million places for good brunch though. And if you're willing to extend your reach into the Bay Area in general, those options increase exponentially :)

There's a lot more fun and adventure in trying to find that place that will have a line next week or month :)

I think the last point about a comedian using it fill an audience is very interesting. Even though they are paid to be there, comedy and humor is a very natural response and not all that easy to fake or disguise. It's like focus group testing for standup comedy.

It's quite expensive for a comedian to do this on a regular basis though.

So essentially the entire chain is fake now. It's basically the sign of the apocalypse.

The entire chain: the facebook likes are fake, the hipsters, the customers, even the press release? Do those restaurants even exist in reality ;) ?

I tried to think of a realistic scenario where someone would be inclined to fake the existence of a restaurant: to make real estate look more appealing? If a RE developer built a development with several dozen houses, it could boost the values of houses enough to make it worth the cost of faking a few trendy bars/creameries/restaurants next door.

Money laundering. Also works with dry cleaning.

Unfortunately.

But the Salmon probably isn't real.

Nice, it's just like you 'seed the tip jar'. Nothing more contagious than social proof (reference - http://jonahberger.com/books/contagious/)

Download the Android app because of curiosity. Asks for my Facebook password, uninstalled.

it uses information about what you like, what your friends like etc to determine if it wants to hire you for a gig

Why not just use Facebook oauth flow though?

Edit: or is that what parent comment meant by "asks me for my Facebook password"?

Nope, it opens up a fake Facebook login screen, themed to look like Facebook

How do you know it's fake?

To be fair it probably isn't fake, but apps should not be asking me for my Facebook password.

The app requires you to always allow them to track your location. It seemed like an interesting app till I found that out. I probably won't open it back up until I hear that they change this.

Is there anything from stopping someone having a backpack full of phones and pretending to be the whole crowd.

Okay, they'll probably work that out pretty quick and ban you. But three or four accounts you might get away with?

Mostly backpacks full of phones likely cost more than each phone could net you.

Most bitcoin mining rig costs more than it mines (per day? week?)

You should probably count your blessings if the asymptotic behaviour is better than break-even.

Nobody is forcing the participants to stay, of course, but if they leave, they won’t be paid — their movements are being tracked with geolocation.

You have to be there to get paid, and that is a good way for them to know you actually are. Is there any other way I wonder ..

EDIT: did you mean that the app should turn off tracking when you're not "working"? then you're right but maybe it is due to software or hardware limitations.

People will get a cheap throw-away Android phone, install the app, sign up, turn on tracking, then hide the phone somewhere near the restaurant, then go do their daily chores.

Under the stand up ashtray is probably best, no one will look under there.

Not that I would condone such a thing.

I suspect for what they pay this would be extremely inefficient with much more hastle free ways to make money. Just my opinion though.

Sadly I imagine the GPS or cell data reception under the ashtray is subpar. The app might also check accelerometer data to check that the phone is slightly moving, or buzz the user after a few minutes.

That is trivially easy to detect.

I know for a fact I've seen GPS spoofing apps, at least for android.

There are other ways besides GPS, though. With enough permissions, they can track you using the Wifi APs and cellphone towers around you.

A cute way would be to tell you to connect to the Internet using the restaurant's Wifi, and then they'd detect the IP of the connection your phone was making to their servers.

Most android apps force you to give them the permission to get your location at any time, when installing the app. Heck, I am sure if you're using iOS there are apps getting your location all the time too. Kinda pointless to stop a simple app getting your location when you have Google and Facebook obviously selling it to the highest bidder.

iOS 11 has an option to disable this even when the app explicitly says they only support background location access.

Joke's on them, I only exist at home or at the office, and I move between locations by Uber while staring at my phone. Not going to see any of this.

Then you are probably not the target group in the first place.

Whenever I watch the Apple WWDC keynote, and I hear the handful of enthusiastic screams from the audience when Tim Cook announces some new feature, I always wonder if those are genuine or not. They just don't seem real. Like 99% of people watching, I've never attended in person, so it's hard to tell.

The front rows at Apple's keynotes are usually reserved for Apple employees and often this includes the teams that built the products that are being announced. So the excitement is genuine, but from Apple employees, not random attendees.

I showed up very late to an Apple keynote about 10 years back, and was grabbed while walking in by some staffer to sit in a third row seat. I had no affiliation with Apple; I assume I was picked because I "looked the part" (which was, apparently, a college aged nerdy computer science student).

So yeah, I'm sure it's mostly Apple employees, with randoms like myself thrown in here to make the crowd shots less homogenous.

Any operator of such announcements know that seeding a crowd is highly effective. You don't need all of the screams to be planted -- 5-10% should be enough.

I downloaded the app, and it seems you can only login with Facebook. Deleted.

Something about this app reminds me of Ben Bernanke's idea for throwing money from helicopters as fiscal stimulus. http://fortune.com/2016/04/12/bernanke-helicopter-money/

Not just restaurants but to go to clubs also. You get payed more if you're hot than if you're not, i.e. if you're a woman.

don't all downvote me all at once for the truth : https://www.bradsdeals.com/blog/earn-money-with-surkus

All, you have to do is offer half off on something and people will stand in line for an hour to buy it.

The item must be worth at least a dollar though.

Well im off to collect a bet - i always predicted faked consumers.

next app: get notification when the line is over

Not all that different from the 18th century "claque," when theater owners or playwrights would pay groups to attend their performances and applaud loudly. A variant was paying a group to boo and hiss a rival production.

A line doesn't make me want to go to a place. I prefer someplace that's not super crowded, though obviously not totally empty.

That sounds a lot like how many sitcoms use a laugh track. I remember when I was young and naive, I thought "that can't possibly be funny. He only answered the bloody door", thinking it was real people.

I now know that laughter stimulates laughter so it kinda makes sense. You can make a show funnier by pretending an audience is laughing.

In this sense, a queue out of the door shows high demand. Generally, people want things in high demand.

Would people want to wear diamonds if they were as cheap as glass and the price reflected that?

It's pathetic if you base your dining decision on a line outside. I would never stand in line so I dine only at restaurants that accept reservations or call ahead to see if there is a wait. This app is for goofy hipsters who have zero gravitas and don't know it.

No. Those hipsters also have a fb following and tweet and instagram pictures. This may be a solid investment for a place, akin to asking in a well know food critic to come to their place and eat... presumably for his following. Ok, so maybe it doesn't work on you, it will work on others.

I would classify this as subliminal seeding.

This type of marketing would probably be more effective in the former USSR.

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