Computer glitch leads to supermarket free-for-all

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/computer-glitch-leads-to-supermarket-freeforall-20110425-1dtah.html

by jdrucker • 15 years ago

32 19 15 years ago

smh.com.au

tzs• 15 years ago

Sounds like idiotic design, not a computer glitch. The doors should be opened by an employee, not by an automated system.

CallMeV• 15 years ago

What began as a simple glitch and a footnote in the history of howlers and error turned into an interesting tale of morality, honour and ethics. Fascinating.

RK• 15 years ago

I think this shows the promise of fully automated shops (the honor system + technology?).

Joakal• 15 years ago

The Japanese have vending machines for nearly everything related to shopping.

bemmu• 15 years ago

You're right in that blogs like to claim this a lot, but sadly the reality doesn't quite match the image. Around my area I can get about 100 different drinks from vending machines, but apart from that I can only think of machines that sell condoms / dating club membership cards and one that sells diet candy bars.

jrockway• 15 years ago

"This [Pak 'n Save incident] is like some mad experiment, because you've sent off to church the religious and it's the secular who have gone shopping on Good Friday ... and you've put them to the test.

Citation needed.

magicalist2• 15 years ago

I don't know why you're getting voted down. It's a pretty central quote in the article, and it is of course ridiculous to assume that all religious people were at church between 8am and 9:20am on good friday.

idonthack• 15 years ago

Yeah, it is pretty farfetched to assume that a significant portion of a religion's adherents would bother to observe one of that religion's major holidays.

baddox2• 15 years ago

That's got to be one of the easiest ethical tests those potential shoppers ever faced.

sliverstorm• 15 years ago

... Why do you imagine it was so easy? If you feel the "correct" answer is "obvious", you simply have a strong moral predisposition in one direction already. Many people teeter on the fence.

scotty79• 15 years ago

Single word. Cameras.

To behave amoraly you'd have to assume that cameras aren't rolling or conceal your identity acknoledging openly that you are a thief which most of regular people are not comfortable with.

baddox2• 15 years ago

I imagine it would be easy, because it's a clear cut case of good old fashion theft. Doesn't everyone (even thieves) know that theft is unethical?

Perhaps is the shoppers were having trouble taking financial care of themselves or their family, it might be worth calling an ethical dilemma, but the article mentions nothing about that.

whimsy• 15 years ago

"They weren't in for a free-for-all. They were doing their normal shopping and then got to the checkout. Half of them paid and the other half thought, `this is a good deal' and walked out."

This is poorly titled.

Ratfish• 15 years ago

What a rubbish headline. And to think the owner is quoted in the same article saying ""They weren't in for a free-for-all". Bad reporting.

And I have no idea how this came to be a religious debate. New Zealand is pretty much secular and religion has almost no bearing on the lives of the majority and is pretty much absent from politics. Especially in Hamilton. Go there on a Friday when there is a holiday and petty theft will seem tame!

Edit: a slighty better version of story. Wow they open early. http://www.3news.co.nz/Computer-glitch-opens-Hamilton-Pak-n-...

extension• 15 years ago

Professor Morris said the footage revealed nearly all would have paid had alcohol purchases not blocked the self-scanners.

So the choice was: leave without paying VS put all the groceries back on the shelf and leave empty handed, wasting an enormous amount of your own time due to the store's screw-up. Not really a fair "moral test".

Computer glitch leads to supermarket free-for-all

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