Hacker News Reader

Touch screens have been around for a long time. Just like the situation on the upper end with AI: I don't think it's the technology, people are actually getting worse at socializing (creating stress for the people responsible) and so socialization is becoming more expensive and opportunities for it are becoming more rare.

This could get a lot worse before it gets better.

View on HN

McDonalds broadly rolled out touchscreen ordering after covid became a thing. That’s why it gets called out in these discussions.

Ironic because it involves hundreds of people touching the same object. Not the best for infection control!

I am under the impression most infections from infectious disease is from airborne particles.

They existed before Covid but many franchisees didn’t want to bother with the expense (or saw relatively bad uptake).

Now they’re ubiquitous but mainly for people who don’t use the app, it seems.

My general observation is that a lot of self-service wasn't super-popular pre-COVID. But, now, it's become more entrenched and a lot of people just grumble and deal with it while a lot of stores made the investment and accept the (probably overall) reduced cost even if customers don't love it. My local DIY home store doesn't even really have regularly-staffed full checkout lanes any longer.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com