My thoughts exactly.
These days I’m skeptical when a new piece of tech is advertised as “the thing you never knew you needed”. Google Home must get so much marketing data from all the random facts that people ask it for.
These were my thoughts too … 
Wow. I’ve never heard about this before. Is it just for identifying shoplifters, or something else?
Apparently this technology does exist in the UK, but it seems it hasn’t been widely reported on, judging from my Google search results…
If they identify you, they show you personalized advertisements on displays (for example at/in the checkout queue). For example if you buy regularly dog food you will see on a display an advertisement for dog food while other customers will see other advertisements. And of course they record your way through the whole market to create a profile (to send you personalized advertisements or discount coupons).
AFAIK in Germany there were some pharmacies who did that.
I don’t like the sound of that. I would feel like someone was constantly watching and trying to manipulate me into buying certain things. I wouldn’t be surprised if this becomes the norm in supermarkets in a few years’ time…
Because that’s the case! 
Yeah, and what’s worse, Amazon/Apple/… having all your data and sharing it with others (like the NSA) or 123 small dealers (all with their very own (backup) morality and security issues)? Most of these security services only offer a certain level of persistance (for money), or do you think if the CIA is hunting you, tunnel bear will really gonna help you?
For the vast majority (in industrial and emerging nations) privacy is gone since quite some time. A lot of data is available already and it will be way more in the future. It’s about drawing connections, interpretations and how you want to utalise this information. How interesting are you? Can someone take an advantage and/or make money with it? In some cases you will benefit from it as well.
Having data, knowing and doing stuff, could be a good thing if a.o. it would be used in a trustworthy, anonymous way, where the individual (to some degree) is a sovereign. Thinking decades ahead but being quickly responsive. Thinking on a global scale but respecting local conditions, lead by smart people and AIs, working for a reasonable percentage of the majority. You don’t want such a god like power in the hands of badass profiteers and shameless, dumb politicians.
Hmm, many religious people must be used to the idea, that someones knows everything about you everytime, already.
In which cases?
What’s wrong with a store where you can buy things without waiting at the cashpoint? Pulling stuff out of the shopping cart, waiting, sometimes the scanner doesn’t get the barcode right, putting it back. Unless you weren’t into the cashier, this wasn’t the most entertaining part of the shopping tour. Of course jobs will get lost but it’s not a secret that there exist far more uneducated people than simple work (and qualified work as well [which also will be redefined and partly replaced in the future]).
Then there might be automatic refilling, delivery … I would welcome if they would stop selling tobacco and small bottles of alcohol at the cashpoints where you need to stand with your children (they aren’t allowed to watch horror movies but all these cancer pictures seem to be alright, or drawing attention to such goods). Their typical excuse is ‘We can’t put his into a special corner because we can’t afford the extra worker. They need to control, who is allowed to buy the stuff or prevents it from being stolen.’
Health care (no need to fill out the same papers when you visit a different doctor. Simplified communication between your healthcare insurance, your doctors and medical supplier. Your data could be analysed and you could receive suggestions based on similar cases. An AI device could assist the doctor based on your data.)
Optimising self-driving car services and reducing pollution/energy consumption/resources … I mean there are many options, you just need to look at your life, infrastructure and stuff.
Data is like a knife, you can use it for good and bad things.
Resistance is futile… The Autofac Amazon will own us all soon.
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Please forgive me for the OT, just to answer this side conversation…
That’s interesting. Sometimes I go off half-cocked (hope this is the correct translation 
) but my experience showed that everytime I searched for an item via Google, results on Amazon showed Amazon itself selling it (via the warehouses about which talked @Someone - I would go crazy only at the idea of working there -) while results on eBay showed 99,9% of times third-party sellers with many times real stores (also a human dimension).
So I associate web-platform like eBay to a service that offers an opportunity to the third-party stores (which usually give also a good assistance to the buyer); while web-platform like Amazon the bad reputation I said in my previous message.
@LowLevel also very kindly, and precisely as ever (this is intended to be a compliment) sent me this article which states that, according to the company, almost 50% of all items purchased on Amazon come from third-party stores.
I still wonder why my experience is in no way similar to that…anyway
Which is because they ARE selling nearly everything.
If you go to a product on Amazon it usually shows it from the cheapest seller.
In case Amazon sells this product too it often IS the cheapest seller and that’s why you see it first.
Example: Star Trek Panic Board Game is sold by Amazon directly.
But if you want to buy it from another seller just click on “Used & new” which shows you 19 different sellers in this case.
You can see the top one being Amazon but you can buy it from anyone you like.
In the column “Delivery” you can see if they are using an Amazon fulfilment centre or they really ship it themselves from their own store/warehouse. When it’s the latter then their individual shipping rates apply of course.
Well, nowadays I associate Amazon more with AWS then with anything else.
Amazon is a scary thing. In Poland we have five huge Amazon warehouses (a logistic centre as they call it) and they are straight from Orwell’s nightmares. People work for 10 hours moving packages, directed by computers and controlled by computers (“You’re working too slow, walk faster!”). You can never get the job done for the day - there’s always more packages, until your 10 hours will pass.
Obviously people work there for the lowest wage possible and the punchline is - we don’t even have Amazon service in Poland! All these packages are going probably to Germany, our wealthy neighbor. They are just using Poles for cheap labor. This shit is happening in the middle of Europe.
I read that at least one of their new warehouses despite having 1000 workers is mostly operated by robots and in this case I think that’s good. This work seems like hell.
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Yep, sorry to say that this is true.
No, not for Amazon.
Sadly, no. In Germany we have these “logistic centers” too with the same beep conditions for the “workers”. (There is one of this buildings near my hometown.)
So this:
is valid for Germany too. They even count how often the people have to go to the restrooms/WC.
Yep. And don’t forget that they don’t pay taxes (or very few).
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Not for amazon but for many other businesses. Living near the border I´ve heard many stories.
Then ask the German people who live near the Swiss border.
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@Amazon
If you haven’t seen it in real, there exist some ‘scary’ videos.
@rich neighbour
Well, this depends on the region you’re living and your personal situation. Are you more the rich or the poor kind of person? How do you expect people are living in Germany? Do you have the same costs of living? Do you also ‘invest’ into the EU and other countries? Do you participate in migration and transform your country into something, uhm, ‘new’ or do you drive in one of those trucks, making holes into streets? Btw. will you move east after reparations and ask Russia too? …
Now let me take look at the stats about how many people are living from Hartz 4, how many jobs some need to get the next month done, the state of our infrastructure, the money our schools lack … but hey we certainly have more occupation troops from the USA. You can have those. Maybe we can get back to a souvereign country this way.
What???