"People buying the exact same item from the exact same store are sometimes paying a price as much as 23% higher on the platform Instacart, thanks to AI algorithms that show buyers different prices. This new technology known as artificial intelligence could lead to cures for cancer and an end to world hunger. But you know it's not going to!"
"Right now, Instacart is quietly running experiments on millions of us while we shop for groceries online. They are trying to figure out exactly how much they can get away with charging you for breakfast cereal, lunch meat, pasta, and everything in between."
Instacart deploys AI-powered dynamic pricing that presents different prices to different shoppers for the same item from the same store. Examples include the same carton of eggs and boxes of cereal showing price variations up to 23 percent. The platform is running large-scale experiments to determine how much extra it can charge consumers. The practice mirrors surge pricing used by ride-hailing and airlines and raises concerns about transparency, fairness, consumer protection, and potential discriminatory effects of opaque algorithms prioritizing corporate revenue over public benefit.
Read at sfist.com
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