Shopping futures: Buyer Beware
The shopping experience of the future, what will it be like? It's certainly a question on the minds of many anarchists these days. In all seriousness, though, even the most self-righteous dumpster diver who never sets foot in a Wal-Mart or a mall would do well to pay attention to developments in the retail industry."From an operational point of view, self-scanning removes human intervention from the equation," says Nick Gladding, senior researcher at retail analyst Verdict. Gladding was interviewed in a recent article for IT Week online, and what he meant by 'human intervention' is that the cashier can't hook you - or him or herself - up anymore. RFID - coming soon (maybe already here) to a store near you - will usher in a new era of tracking and regulation of goods in and around the store (and probably beyond).
The elite has always placed great value in technology as a class war weapon, and RFID is no different in this respect. Workers power will be increasingly reduced on the job as more and more work becomes deskilled or replaced, and wages and benefits will suffer accordingly. And, this being capitalism, redundancy brings starvation, not retirement, for workers.
Terry Crookes, IT manager of retailer Streetwise Sports, says, "It is all about loss prevention and stock control. The other big thing is to know the amount of theft committed internally." That's nothing new to regular readers of this blog. Technological advancements at work generally focus on increasing management control of workers or 'inventory control' - a codeword for 'theft.' Not the kind of theft like when your boss forgets to pay you all the hours she owes you. The kind of theft where you get even with your thieving boss. The kind that can get you fired or sent to jail.
As reported in the business section of the Scotsman last week,
In Japan, the process is set to go further as department store Mitsukoshi pilots radio frequency identification (RFID) tags to help improve customer satisfaction.It's sold as customer convenience, but RFID, combined with data mining, will put the lie once and for all to the myth that the capitalist hates regulation, because the new technology will allow them to count and quantify almost everything, down to the most painful and embarrassingly private details. They may not like being regulated themselves, but as much as it sounds like a socialist dream, the capitalist in the next few years will be revealed for the pathological regulatory fetishists that we knew they really were all along. They want to know where everything - and everyone - in their store is at every possible time. And RFID will help them do it.
In the ladies' shoe department, every pair of shoes is fitted with an RFID tag. By scanning the tag at a nearby kiosk salespeople can instantly receive detailed information about available sizes, colours and descriptions.
Where the necessary shoes are in stock, staff in the stockroom can be called to bring the shoes to the customer.
You may not have known it, Mr. and Ms. American Consumer (or anti-consumer, as the case may be), but it turns out that you have been demanding this technology all along. Frustrated at the amount of time pulling your wallet out several times a day steals from you, you have forced the powerless capitalists into spending massive amounts of money on this new technology - all for your convenience!
The capitalists have successfully shifted most Americans' identities within the system from workers to consumers, and as such we think of ourselves coming in contact with the capitalist system as demanders of services rather than receivers of orders, as receivers of discounts rather than providers of low wage labor. With a title that reflects this transformation of identity, the article, "How retailers can keep the customer satisfied," illuminates the point at which the two identities come into conflict.
Analyst Gartner predicts retailers using RFID to improve on-shelf availability will begin to outperform rivals in customer satisfaction by the end of this year.The problem, and what most Americans don't seem to realize, is that workforce management comes hand in hand with this alleged consumer satisfaction. Can someone be a satisfied consumer at the same time the boss is looming over her shoulder with "workforce management technologies to ensure that replenishment tasks are allocated and completed." Time will tell.
The number one issue for the shopper is out-of-stock merchandise – an inconvenience that causes 47 per cent of customers to shop elsewhere as a result. New RFID implementations must be linked to workforce management technologies to ensure that replenishment tasks are allocated and completed.
More commonly known as subsidies or entitlements when they go to poor people - which they increasingly do not - this technology has been massively supported through 'guaranteed markets' in the Defense budget, where all DoD suppliers will be required to utilize RFID by 2007. In fact, the Department of Defense now provides RFID manufacturers their biggest market, second only to Wal-Mart, itself renowned for its reactionary attitude towards workers. CircuitAssembly.com reported on January 26th that,
[s]ales of RFID tags and related products will hit $2.71 billion this year, and rise to $12.35 billon by 2010, says research firm IDTechEx.The impact on the overall market is expected to be huge. Under the ominous subheading, "A trillion tags by 2015," an article from PhysOrd.com claimed
[t]he potential impact of RFID is so vast it is attracting the attention of industry and government worldwide. In October 2005, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) dedicated a special session to RFID's economic promise and social implications. Delegates from business and research organizations highlighted applications from healthcare to tire pressure monitoring.It's interesting how one rarely hears the capitalists complain about the distortions in the market caused by governments subsidizing or facilitating the adoption of technologies intended to dominate workers.
But, unsurprisingly, the public dialogue is framed in terms of customer convenience, not class struggle. Consider the glowing terms that Digital Life Magazine uses to describe the digital shopping cart of the future.
It's the greatest feeling in the world to walk into a busy supermarket and leave without saying a single word. Now, that's possible with the super electronic shopping cart that comes loaded with an RFID scanner, an LCD screen, all hooked to a kart [sic] for purchasing up at the register. You never have to ask for assistance about how much something costs, or maybe even the location of products in the store - if the technology includes a "search" feature.I shudder to think just how terrifying an experience contemporary shopping must be for these folks. Their already crippling social anxiety disorders amplified due to reduced human contact, these folks seem to relish the lack of human contact future shopping will afford them: "It really would be awesome for this technology to spread world wide, as if would make operations a whole lot smoother, and easier to execute. "
Efficiency is definitely one of the key advantages highlighted by RFID enthusiasts. Never is it explained just how or when paying cash had become inconvenient; the point is that cashless transactions - aside from being easier to regulate (not generally mentioned) - are just plain more convenient, or simpler. Again, from PhysOrg.com:
Nonetheless, the benefits of RFID are undeniable. It makes life easier - and not just in what might be called 'typical' applications. Philips has recently showcased product concepts that represent an expression of our promise of Sense and Simplicity over the next three to five years. Many incorporate RFID and / or intuitive wireless connectivity.But because RFID's main application - regulation of workers and consumers - is beyond dispute (and comment in the mainstream), the arguments made in favor of the technology often border on the ridiculous.