Vacation robot bartenders: neat tech or social buzzkill?

I thought they were fun, but friends argued it kills the chat with a real bartender. How do you see it?

4 comments

4 Comments

But have you ever really made a friend because of a machine? I see what @olivermason means about it being a talking point, but it feels like a weak replacement. You just lose that real back-and-forth with someone who actually gets the crowd.

olivermason1d ago

Actually, robot bartenders don't have to ruin the social vibe. They give people something new to chat about, which can actually help break the ice. So it's more like adding a cool feature than taking away the human touch, lol.

averyshah1d ago

You're right that they become something to talk about, olivermason, but that's just covering for a loss. It's like self-checkout lanes - yeah, you might chat with a stranger about the dumb machine, but you used to have a real, quick chat with the cashier. The tech becomes the social topic because it removed the normal human interaction.

drew_patel12h ago

Reminds me of the last time I flew, actually. All those self check in kiosks at the airport, and the one next to me just froze up completely. This guy and I ended up just staring at the error screen together, then he made a joke about the machine needing a vacation more than we did. We talked for ten minutes while waiting for a real person to come fix it. So maybe the robot thing is just there to give us all a common problem to complain about.