Amazon made a bigger camera-spying store—so we tried to steal its fruit

Enlarge / Amazon Go Grocery's first location in the Seattle neighborhood of Capitol Hill. (credit: Sam Machkovech)

SEATTLE-For how far and wide Amazon's digital footprint reaches, the company clearly wants to advance into real-world space as much as possible. And to that end, Amazon runs some of its most ambitious experiments in its headquarters' city before rolling them out nationwide.

As our staff's sole Seattle resident, I pull the short straw of testing these by default.

In 2015, I shopped at Amazon's first stab at a brick-and-mortar bookstore (you know, those old things Amazon has been accused of putting out of business in the first place) before that chain's eventual nationwide launch. In 2016, I delivered Amazon packages as a gig-economy driver, before this kind of contract employee became a commonplace part of the nationwide Amazon Prime Now network. And in 2018, I picked through the first "cashierless," camera-filled Amazon Go convenience store before the same concept landed in other major metropolitan centers.

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