Germany's 's Baggers Restaurant
Yesterday, the BBC covered a new restaurant 's Baggers in Nuremberg, Germany. The high-tech restaurant features computer monitors where you place your order, and when your meal is ready it's put on rails and sent down to you lidded and stickered to signify your specific order. There isn't anyone at the counter to greet you or take your order--the restaurant is completely wait-staff-free (aside from the cooks). This all sounds fun, right? But, what would the effects of something like this be on society?
If successful in Nuremberg and internationally scalable, we'd probably see a downturn in the number of restaurant-sector jobs worldwide. Would this downturn be significant? Possibly. But, would a downturn enable/encourage restaurant employees to move on to more exciting job opportunities. Probably.
I'm definitely not a Luddite nor a social anthropologist, but what could the effects be on a culture's social interactions? Hmm. This could get interesting!
--Sous-Chef on the Run
ZZMike on April 10, 2008 at 12:39 PM
Not only that, but what would aspiring actors and actresses do?
Brian Erst on April 10, 2008 at 01:04 PM
This sounds like a combination of an automat (meal vending machines) and a fairly typical Japanese sushi/noodle house (where meals move on an endless conveyer belt and you grab whatever looks good).
I don't think either one has had much effect on the broader society. Automats have largely died out in the States (still around in France, I think) and the "conveyer belt of food" Japanese model is more of a novelty outside Japan.
If there were an effect on social interaction, which interaction are you concerned about? The friendly cross-class interaction (lower wage restaurant workers with higher wage patrons) or the master/servant interaction ("get me my food!"/"yes sir!")? My guess is that the two interactions largely cancel each other out. Outside of really high-end or really low-end (think Daniel Boulud's or your local greasy spoon diner), your typical interaction with the staff is one the order of a minute or two per meal.
DelD on April 10, 2008 at 06:11 PM
Uh-oh. It's begun.
Read Marshall Brain's essay, Robotic Nation, for his take on this very subject.
http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-nation.htm
bour3 on April 10, 2008 at 09:26 PM
Oh poop. I thought this was going to be about robot waitresses and droid busboys.