Smart cricket balls, restaurant preferences ... seeing as how this discussion has touched on a variety of distantly related things already:
I wrote the following today as a sort of thought-provoking joke (or maybe I was just really bored) and posted it to Slashdot.
Officials at one of America's largest "all you can eat" restaurants announced today a new method of cost-cutting.
Tuesday, November 25th
For immediate release
Raleigh, NC: Silver Bucket, a nation-wide franchise restaurant chain with over 200 all-you-can-eat restaurants, has just introduced a new technology called Digital Plate Management, or DPM for short. Company executives are said to be excited about this new technology as they expect it will end the ability for unscrupulous customers to share food with non-paying companions.
"We've always faced a certain 'undesirable' component to our clientele," says Bryan Dawkins, CEO of Silver Bucket. He adds, "You can tell who they are as soon as they arrive. They'll arrive in twos or threes ... sometimes more. Only one or two will buy the buffet though. The others just matter-of-factly state they only want a soft drink."
Dawkins adds, "They're lying, of course. We seldom see it happen as they've become such experts at this kind of blatant theft, but come on ... there's no way someone comes into our restaurant as part of group and only wants a soft drink. You immediately know they're up to no good."
The Digital Plate Management technology that is now being deployed at Silver Bucket restaurants will bring an end to all that. The system relies on a high-tech buffet plate that is designed to work only with the person who purchases the buffet menu option. "These plates are going to save our bacon," says Dawkins. "They are just the most fantastic devices we've ever seen." The plates, which cost the company a little over $1300 a piece, are encoded at the time the customer makes their purchase upon entry into the restaurant. From that point on, the plate is designed to maintain its rigidity only when held by the authorized patron. "If someone else picks them up, they go completely flaccid. The plates, that is," adds Dawkins. In other words, the plates will only be useful for the authorized customer.
Digital Plate Management is the results of years of research, combining stunning effort in both materials engineering and biometrics. The plates include integrated sensors that allow them to be encoded with biometric data when the customer is first handed the plate. The plate stores information about the registered user such as fingerprints, skin elasticity, and body temperature. If these values change beyond a certain range of acceptable values, the plate goes limp. That might seem like a problem for restaurant staff, but the plates have been designed to handle encoding for more than one person. "One of the incredible features of these plates is that they can be encoded to allow any of our restaurant employees to handle the plate without having the plate become flaccid," adds Dawkins. This means that, while customers cannot share their plates amongst themselves, restaurant staff will be free to handle the plates when clearing tables and during dish washing. "Oh certainly, in the restaurant business, you never want to annoy your staff with potential hurdles like that," states Dawkins. He continues, "Multiple user encoding was one of the first things they had to solve in the design of these plates."
"Silver Bucket is committed to providing a first class customer experience," explains Dawkins. "Digital Plate Management is an absolutely revolutionary method for maintaining the level of quality our customers expect. These plates will allow us to make sure that only those honest, paying customer will have access to our all-you-can-eat buffet. We will thus be able to ensure a high-quality menu for our guests, and improve the bottom line for our shareholders."
Customer reaction has been mixed. David Johnson, a long time Silver Bucket patron says, "This doesn't make much sense to me. I mean, they're spending $1300 on each plate? I'm surprised it was that big of a problem; were they really losing that much money to people sharing food?" He thinks for a moment and then continues, "And what the heck happens if I drop one of them new-fangled plates? Do they want me to pay for it or what?" His wife Clare adds, "I'm really not sure I like this idea. What if I ask David to go and get me some more chicken wings while I look after our 3 year-old? It would be more than a bit awkward to see something otherwise rigid go completely flaccid the moment he takes it in his hands."
Company officials concede there will be some adjustment on the part of their clientele, but they maintain that the net result will be worth it.
Look for Digital Plate Management (DPM) at a Silver Bucket near you. The roll-out is expected to start today.
