Motorola Unveils Phone Vending Machines

DaveWick79 writes "The 'Instantmoto' is being installed at 20 malls and airports nationwide and will carry about 30 products including 12 phones and 18 accessories. Included is the popular Razr and you can choose whether or not to purchase with a service plan. Instead of being dropped into a tray, apparently a robotic arm will 'gently deliver' the product to consumers. The only question now is, will we be able to pay for these items using our cell phones?"

The bigger question...

[Tavor]

Is if these are being installed in airports, will we be able to take them onto planes in the future?

ipod.. maybe not so bad.

[adam]

cellphone vending machines just seem like a bad idea to me.. the general public is not very sharp, and need things spelled out for them by an "informed" consultant (aka guy in collared shirt who makes min wage + %).

ipod vending on the other hand.. not nearly so many options, and i could see myself using an ipod vending machine in an airport. generally when i am flying, i am in a rush and trying not to forget things, and inevitably i forget something stupid.. like bringing a book to read, etc. this is why periodical shops exist in airports. if the vending machine had an ipod that included the ability to perform itunes purchase + wireless download enabled, that is a combination i can see being very effective in airports; buy ipod, download $30 worth of itunes music, enjoy flight. of course, it's moot because ipod doesn't do wireless download [yet?].

a vending machine

[Xargle]

is news? given that there are already plenty of ipod vending machines etc in similar locations why is this worthy of any sort of attention? now if there was a hack to get free product from them.... then i'd be interested.

Re:Depersonify

[Sqwubbsy]

Yeah- the idea is that you don't have to interact with a person. Any more it seems that many people are more comfortable interacting with machines anyhow.


Have you dealth with any of the winners working at the cell phone store? They're almost as bad as Radio Shack associates (or whatever they're called.)

Target audience?

[Inoshiro]

Seriously, I'm not about to go buying 150-450$ of iPod + iTunes music on a spur-of-the-moment thing from a vending machine at an airport. How many people are honestly going to do this?

Re:Disposable Phones...

[thesandtiger]

I use "disposable" phones all the time when I travel for pleasure. They're a fantastically useful thing for many purposes, and if they get stolen (NOT an uncommon experience) it isn't like it's a huge loss.

For day-to-day use, yeah, they're a dumb idea. But for certain uses, they're awesome.

Re:Target audience?

[AtomicBomb]

You miss the point: it is just another type of advertisment board.