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Abstract(s)
AS), they are typically described as AI-powered physical spaces that
monitor customer interactions, automatically bill for items, and allow
customers to simply pick up goods and leave without the traditional
checkout (Phillips et al., 2022). Media often describe autonomous stores
as the «store of the future» (NYT, 2018, news article) and the «future
of shopping» (The Guardian, 2016, news article), demonstrating how
technology can enhance everyday life (PT specialized media, 2023, news
article). These stores are expected to disrupt retail and consumption,
conflating imaginaries of technological progress in the service of consumer
convenience and automation.
This chapter aims to probe the «sociotechnical imaginaries» (Jasanoff
& Kim, 2009; Jasanoff, 2015) of autonomous stores that circulate in
news media. Defined by Jasanoff as «collectively held, institutionally
stabilized, and publicly performed visions of desirable futures, animated
by shared understandings of forms of social life and social order attainable
through, and supportive of, advances in science and technology» (2015: 4),
sociotechnical imaginaries highlight the performative role of discourse and
imagination in bringing entities and worlds into existence.
We examine how autonomous stores are defined, the purported needs
that drive them, the users they conjure, and their broader implications.
Our analysis is based on 137 media articles written about AS published
across selected legacy and specialized outlets between 2016 and 2023
in Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States, which were
thematically analysed using MaxQDA software (Braun & Clarke, 2006).
The chapter stems from an ongoing research project funded by the
Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, Autonomous Stores:
Sociotechnical Infrastructures, Imaginaries and Data Governance, that
seeks to examine how autonomous stores are materially and discursively
constituted, maintained, and used.
Description
Keywords
Pedagogical Context
Citation
Viseu, A., Pereira, J. P., Delicado, A. (2025). Smartness as a New Paradigm for Retail? Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Autonomous Stores in the Media. In E. Lucano e P. Orru (eds), Artificial Intelligence and Human Perception: Media Discourse and Public Opinion, pp. 39-54. Milano: FrancoAngeli