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Polis Report

Screen Server

By Richard Sine

Downwardly mobile Gen-Xers tease and frighten each other by speculating whether a college degree is needed to recite the mantra, "Would you like fries with that?" But the kids working at Arby's Restaurant on Stevens Creek Boulevard are denied even this small privilege, as customers order by touching computer screens on the counter. There's an eerie silence as customers cast their gaze screenward and employees wait until their order is complete. The computer asks: "Would you like to try a delicious dessert?"

The computers are not news: the restaurant has used them since 1988. In 1991, a wire story declared that 40 Arby's nationwide used computers. They speed ordering during crunch times, an Arby's manager told us. But there's little evidence the trend has caught on. Is it the $40,000 to $60,000 cost of installation? Is it the occasional confusion among first-time users? We have our own theory.

Computer screens may be where fast-food Taylorism was leading all along. Perhaps it's less dispiriting to program a computer to ask absurd routine questions than to program a person to do so. But perhaps the little conversations we have at a place like Arby's--highly ritualized but still recognizably human--are part of what can make the fast-food experience, despite its shortcomings, a balm to the soul. Our boss or girlfriend may be ballistic that day, but at the local franchise we know what to say, and we know what they'll say back.

They'll want to know if we want fries with that.

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