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Comment by prasadjoglekar | Hacker News Reader

The title seems ominous but the article itself is about how a fancy restaurant will go out of it's way to make you feel special. They're perusing your social media for clues.

In the past your spouse or kid would call and let the maitre'd know it was special; now I guess it's a job for someone on staff.

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Until some YC backed SaaS LLM AI automates the process and it becomes table stakes. Then they find other uses for it..

I'm waiting for fully automated writing style recognition that finds all your throwaway accounts and sends you a shakedown letter.

Reproducing Hacker News writing style fingerprinting, by antirez of Redis fame

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43705632

It’s really great that the most successful people in Silicon Valley disregard the social implications of their work. Arguably that’s what makes them so successful.

This was possible before, as the post shows with a previous HN post, nothing to do with Silicon Valley.

'Silicon Valley' here is just proxy for 'self-delusional tech glitterati with a cheap veneer of enlightenment'.

I suspect HN is already checking IP.

I'm waiting for an AI bot that follows everyone around and points out ideological inconsistencies.

"funny, you were all fine with this when X was doing it as evidenced in <cites specific comments>, care to explain why this is different?".

Unlawful in the EU, thankfully. The US seriously needs to revaluate it's data protection laws.

I'm planning to move to Columbia.

I know that high-end restaurants there get extreme in service. That can make me uncomfortable in certain contexts.

Like Columbia, MD? Or the university?

Columbia, South America.

https://archive.ph/o/S25jP/https://cdn.digg.com/wp-content/u...

Colombia. You may need to spell it correctly before you move there. :)

that's a neat map, thanks for sharing

Are we really doing the slippery slope dangers of a high end restaurant going out of their way to delight?

If they're already vetting your social media, they can also start refusing service based upon religious or political leanings displayed in your posts. No slope (slippery or otherwise) is required.

Imagine making reservations for a family dinner but being turned away at the door because the restaurant found a post (in support/critical) of Trump or one of his policies. The restaurant would be completely within its rights to do so, even if it seems a stupid and pointless business decision to cut clientele in half.

So, yes, is your answer to the preceding question.

It's funny when someone ends up proving your point in their attempt to refute it.

I have a friend that just got kicked out of his apartment, because his landlord learned that he has a very different political leaning. To answer the inevitable questions, he was on a month-to-month lease, and his landlord is a cop, so yeah, he’s screwed.

He’s also very politically outspoken on social media. I have suggested, to no avail, that he tone it down. This may do the trick.

There’s a price to be paid for being on stage, all the time. I wonder how many people have lost (or failed to get) jobs, because of stuff they’ve posted on LinkedIn (or here). I know a couple of teachers lost jobs, because they posted pictures of themselves, on vacation, with drinks in their hands.

God forbid that people have lives outside of their job.

I agree. I think the teachers losing their jobs was ridiculous.

To be fair, though, this chap is just a bit left of Mao Zhedong. He posts shit on Facebook, like ACAB. He thought that because he has his rantings restricted to friends-only, they will somehow stay sequestered.

> He thought that because he has his rantings restricted to friends-only, they will somehow stay sequestered.

That's interesting then, how did the landlord find out, through a mutual friend?

Likely. But the landlord is a cop, and he may have done some checking. They have resources.

I see shit copied and pasted from people's private Facebook feeds all the time.

I wonder what lesson the friend learned from this, probably that it reinforces their opinions on cops rather than learning to tone it down as you said. People don't understand that the internet is forever, don't post things you don't want people seeing.

// There’s a price to be paid for being on stage, all the time

No, there's a price to be paid for espousing values outside of the Overton Window - and there always will be in the absence of continuously exercised civil rights.

The last time there was this level of collective punishment and erosion of civil rights (with self-policing sycophants pleading for clemency with the abusers) it was known as McCarthyism. Given that McCarthy’s chief counsel, Roy Cohn, was Trump’s core mentor and lodestone on the American Real Politik, it's easy to chart the ideological fingerprints across the decades.

Clay Risen’s book 'Red Scare' represents a comprehensive overview of the many mechanisms of repression that made the Red Scare possible - from executive orders and congressional-committee hearings to conservative control of vital media outlets - all of which can be directly mapped to the actions of the current cabinet.

//I wonder how many people have lost (or failed to get) jobs, because of stuff they’ve posted on LinkedIn (or here). I know a couple of teachers lost jobs, because they posted pictures of themselves, on vacation, with drinks in their hands.

It starts with the public 'admissions', the low-hanging fruit. Then you get the private investigators leaning on soft-sources for anything that can use as dirt or parallel construction.

The FBI had the Responsibilities Program - where they would share information with PTAs and local school boards. You know: ‘This teacher has a background that’s kind of suspect,’ ‘Here’s a list of books that you want to remove from your library.’

How long until the photo used as grounds-for-termination contains a same-sex couple, or a possible illegal immigrant, or Jerome Powell?

So you’re imagining an unlikely, stupid, and pointless future to justify disliking a well-meaning, positive, friendly present?

I don’t get it. Is the slippery slope that irresistible? Like should I be opposed to all good things in reality because jt is possible to imagine someone pointlessly doing a strange riff on them that I wouldn’t like?

Customer profiling for restaurants is now available as a hosted service.[1] The industry term is "unified guest profile".

"Imagine this: A guest walks into your hotel. The front desk greets them by name, already knows they prefer a room away from the elevator, and offers a complimentary drink, the same cocktail they ordered at your rooftop bar during their last stay. At breakfast the waiter suggests asks if the guest wants the usual omelet or the menu to try something new, and at checkout, they’re offered a late checkout because their flight doesn’t leave until 8 p.m.

That’s not sci-fi. That’s what happens when your guest data systems actually talk to each other."[2]

[1] https://www.hungerrush.com/restaurant-marketing-loyalty/the-...

[2] https://www.hospitalitynet.org/explainer/4127923.html

> Imagine this: A guest walks into your hotel. The front desk greets them by name, already knows they prefer a room away from the elevator, and offers a complimentary drink, the same cocktail they ordered at your rooftop bar during their last stay

> at checkout, they’re offered a late checkout because their flight doesn’t leave until 8 p.m

This would honestly be amazing. Most hotels I've seen don't even want to clean the room as often, and try to minimize the need for front-desk staff.

Everyone hand-wringing over this forgets that learning about you is one thing, but using it requires spending money on making the guest happy, and most businesses won't do that, so they won't pay to collect and process that info.

I like how hotels are either some how the most discrete place regarding someones previous visits or the complete total opposite.

> and it becomes table stakes.

I see what you did there.

Thanks! We've changed the title above to use a more representative phrase from the article.

it's now a vaguer title, perhaps even more ominous because personally my immediate thought was "oh they're collaborating with advertising companies aren't they" before actually clicking on the article

Reminds me of The Menu.

Reminds me of The Bear which has scenes like this. It is quite common in higher end restaurant, like those at the Michelin level to customize the experience for each guest (at least to a small degree, not necessarily changing out the entire menu for them).

Which itself draws from the book ‘Unreasonable Hospitality’ and iirc the Chicago restaurant ‘Ever’ featured in the show applies this approach.

And the Four Seasons has been recognized for this for many years; it was a case study in business school for me.

(The "Ever" in "The Bear" is a composite of many restaurants).

Good point :) the show’s Ever definitely utilizes it but my understanding is the real one does too.

The Bear is literally the lead-in paragraph for the article

Yes, that is why I mentioned it.

Reminding one of something seems like it would exclude directly surfacing or naming the thing, because reminding implies a network hop between the one doing the reminding and the thing one is being reminded of.

Exactly. It’s super weird to say “that reminds me of X” immediately after reading about X.

Somehow I don’t think OP actually read the article before commenting.

It was a somewhat sardonic response to "reminds me of The Menu," I was specifically referencing the actual media that was in the article itself. The words "reminds me of" in this case weren't actually related to any reminder, it was a repetition of the prior comment. You can think of it as similar to the phrase "it's almost as if," as in, the user of that phrase already does know whatever they say next is true but the phrase itself is meant to be a sort of slight mockery of whatever preceded it.

"Forks", the episode from the second season of The Bear, remains my most favorite episode of the series and I believe is the highest rated episode of the entire series. Also love how the episode ended.

Every second counts.

Going to The French Laundry has many similar to The Menu and felt like it was what the movie was satirizing

The Menu is specifically satirizing the show Chef's Table [0]. Notice the same sort of music and compositon of the plates as well as the font.

[0] https://youtu.be/BkN9dDGTgtw

Thanks, I was curious

The Willows Inn is an even stronger parallel.

Literally a tiny island that people travel to and stay at the inn just to eat dinner. When you're there, it appears that the staff outnumber patrons about two to one.

My wife and I went there for an anniversary dinner (and breakfast the next morning). It was an incredible experience. Certainly the best meal of my life and one of the best evenings.

But I watched The Menu later and that movie hit a little too close to home.

Oh noo I missed the experience

https://www.bonappetit.com/story/willows-inn-closed-allegati...

Yeah, the creepy chef taking advantage of his staff also reinforces The Menu vibe of the place. It sucks that Blaine Wetzel is apparently a dirtbag because holy crap could that place put together a dinner.

> It sucks that Blaine Wetzel is apparently a dirtbag because holy crap could that place put together a dinner

I totally support voting with your wallet

I don't really understand the outcome that people want to occur with cancelled people. Ostracized from society ... permanently? What we have now where its not thought out at all but some kind of professional harm is put on a pedestal as accountability?

perhaps some sort of society could be envisioned where even people who have demonstrated they cannot be trusted with their professional responsibilities don't have to worry about a place to sleep and food to eat as a result of such evidently necessary ostracization. if you take care of everyone in your society as a matter of course and principle, you gain the ability to simply remove people from positions they abuse without doing ongoing violence to them by preventing them from immediately finding further positions to abuse. under capitalism, these are linked, which is to everyone's misfortune.

The French Laundry is very fancy and expensive but it is ultimately just extremely well prepared french cuisine with excellent service and wine. It doesn't focus on the experimental or high concept stuff that many younger haute cuisine restaurants have become known for and which is taken to the extreme in The Menu.

Still creepy.

author doesn't understand the definition of "vetting"

which is par for the course for sfgate/chronicle

Restaurants concentrate too hard on the things that are not food.

If a restaurateur and/or the head chef has any pretensions of greatness, then they must master two French dishes, Coq au Vin, and Boeuf Bourguignon.

Before investing in anything else, these are tollgates.

I respect that you at least literally admit that you are gatekeeping.

It is a certain gatekeeping that demands some quantity of flexibility in culinary arts.

To me flexibility in culinary arts would mean that you know dishes from multiple cuisines, not just two dishes from French cuisine.

I'm willing to believe those two dishes represent a wide set of skills and knowledge that would generalize to being a generally skillful cook.

As someone else noted, I don’t believe these skills would translate to sushi making and we’re talking about chefs here not cooks.

I think someone who knows those dishes like the back of their hand would make significantly better sushi than me. On the other hand, I'm willing to bet that someone who just makes burgers probably can make sushi about as well as I could.

Would you expect the best Sushi chefs in the world to be competitive in a professional environment to make French cuisine? My bet is no, they focused their entire career on sushi. Similarly, a professional chef who knows how to make these two dishes really well would not be able to compete with professional sushi chefs without actual training in that specific discipline.

Why both of them? They are both braised meat dishes. They test roughly the same skills and knowledge. Surely if you wanted to pick two french dishes you'd pick two that cover a wider set of skills.

They are also both dishes that are highly forgiving. You can elevate them by replacing the vegetables used in the braise with precisely cooked ones in the final product, by balancing the braising liquid properly, and by getting the final braising liquid to the right consistency but this is largely procedural and involves balancing fewer different elements than sauces that involve spiciness in addition to sweet, sour, and savory.

What flexibility? The two dishes you selected are essentially variations of the same theme: a meat braised in wine with typical European produce and seasoning.

If you want flexibility, ask someone to master ramen and filo dough.

Sounds like someone has never had Massaman curry

That’s complete rubbish. What of the sushi chef who has no knowledge or experience with French cuisine or someone who has mastered how to make a great taco? Would you not consider them masters of their craft, because I sure would.

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