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I've traveled from the Midwest to Utah on Interstate 80. It was interesting to see all the different kinds of gas stations and truck stops. I stopped at many of them to fuel up and eat.
Iowa 80 boasts claims to be the world's largest truck stop, but nothing in particular sticks out in my mind about that place but big signs and lots of fast food. You could always spot Sapp Bros truck stops miles away from the giant coffee-pot sculptures or neon signs.
Then there is Little America in the southwest corner of Wyoming. Starting about 200+ miles east, you start seeing billboards. Fifty cent ice cream cones! The place to relax! Welcome Home! After seeing what seemed like fifty signs for it, I figured I'd stop, top of my tank and get one of those ice cream cones. It's surprisingly nice for a truck stop with the hotel resembling a small-town New England street complete with well-manicured lawns and park benches.
I can't leave out the truck stops with amusing names like Fat Dog and Stinker. Fat Dog was quite an experience. As I walked in the door thumping dance track was playing on the PA system and the cashier was bopping her head to the beat as she exclaimed "Welcome to Fat Dog!". The dance club vibe was at odds with the joint's unnecessarily bright lights and the garish signage. Having walked in at about 9:00 PM after being on the road for 10-12 hours, I left before my eyes even had time to adjust. I was glad to make my exit!
P-games aren't for me, but I could see how they would appeal after a long and boring day of driving. Little America was really nothing to write home about, but it was a nice respite after a ton of driving. I'd definitely stop there again.
A long time ago in the early 1980's I was making a trip from Four Corners to the SLC area. As it happened I needed gas and a restroom break by the time I found the intersection at Crescent Junction, on I-70/191.
Back in those days it had the appearance of a truck stop/service station where one could have a real mechanic fix any problems the driver might have before they headed out of "town".
I gassed up the old Bronco and headed for the bathroom which was accessible from outside the building like a lot of gas station restrooms back then. Inside, I found pissed-on floors, dirty walls, and a typical poorly cleaned commode with a sink stained with lots of things I didn't need to get in touch with. After finishing everything I washed my hands, carefully dodging the goo on the sink surface and then looked for a place to dry my hands.
I found one of those old-time electric hand dryers, which was certainly better than the recycled hand towel spinner so that was a bonus for that facility.
As I looked for the start button to get the air blowing, I noticed a scribbling in fountain pen from some prior visitor up near the manufacturer instructions.
It said - "Press button for your personalized message from Carter." A later visitor had used a magic marker to scratch through Carter and add Reagan.
This was the first time that I had seen this particular restroom graffiti. Thanks for the reminder.
Don't forget; Wall drug or bust.
For real though, little America is probably the least abrasive truck stop.
Although, I personally prefer the little filling stations/general stores you can find away from the interstate in Utah. Or maybe the diner/fuel/casino's that feel like you've stepped out of a time machine in Nevada. Slow paced.
Then you do a road-trip in Italy and get served what would be a Michelin-starred Italian meal back in the US, at some random dingy truck stop, complete with wait staff and white tablecloths.
I haven't road-tripped in other parts of Europe, but Italy easily trounces the Americans in this department...
On I-15 into Utah I think it was, there are a line of billboards advertising the restrooms at a particular gas station, claiming they're best in the state.
Well, I had to stop, and I will say, they were the fanciest I've ever seen outside of pictures itself. That kind of stuff make a difference when you have something like +/- an hour to choose where to stop.
It's not really though. Where's the dark leather and neon vibe and urban decay elements?
Futuristic: yes. Cyberpunk: no.
I Piss this game all the time.
I drink the largest soda the gas station has in Las Vegas and hold in my pee until I get to Eddie's to go for a high score. (Ghosty Brotato if you see me)
Yes touching the screen is dirty, but we are all washing our hands right after going to the bathroom, right? So I can tolerate the germs for a second or two.
They also have insanely good maintenance at Eddies, I wouldn't be surprised if that glass is getting wiped down every two hours.
Not sure if this is my favorite or least favorite answer ever given HN. I am leaning toward the former
Come to my tech conference in SoCal this August!
(Sorry, we won't be offering any pissing games.)
"Welcome to our facility. By using our facilities, you agree to the following terms and conditions:
Biometric Data Collection: Our facility collects biometric data from the urinals. This data includes, but is not limited to, images and measurements of your face, hands, and other body parts. This data is collected for the purpose of identifying and tracking individuals who use our facilities.
Privacy: We take your privacy seriously. All biometric data is encrypted and stored securely on our servers. We do not share this data with any third parties, except as required by law.
Use of Data: The biometric data we collect is used solely for the purpose of improving our facilities and services. We may use this data to optimize flow, improve cleanliness, and enhance security.
Retention of Data: Biometric data is retained for a period of time necessary to achieve the purpose for which it was collected. We may retain this data for up to 30 years, after which it is permanently deleted from our servers.
Compliance: Our facility complies with all applicable laws and regulations related to biometric data collection and privacy.
By using our facilities, you acknowledge that you have read and understand this agreement, and agree to be bound by its terms and conditions. If you do not agree to these terms and conditions, please do not use our facilities."
Some people at MIT media lab were working on similar stuff 20 years ago.
Paper: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/765891.766108
Other info: https://blog.siggraph.org/2021/02/a-look-back-at-past-emergi...
Also notable, Sega Toylets, which I was surprised Yakuza Kiwami 2 didn't make up: https://www.wired.com/2011/01/sega-urinal-games/
I feel like a lot of people read cyberpunk fiction and didn't realize that it's a dystopia, and tried to make it real because it was fun to read.
Like... people had to make these things. They put a lot of work into them. Someone had to come up with this idea, then they had to prototype it, then actually manufacture it, and install it.... and all the people in that chain resulted in advertisements being fed to you while you pee. That's what all those people spent their time doing.
If you ask any of the people in the supply chain, they'll tell you this kind of thing is stupid and probably shouldn't exist. And yet, it does, while other more pressing things we urgently need don't. The incentives of society are totally backwards. This is a priority inversion, which is the kind of thing that can cause a system to fail.
It started out cute ("Alexa, I need TP!"). Now it's getting dystopian while still having a cute outer shell (tracking your genitals and selling you ads while you urinate... but it's a game!). Soon it's going to get real, and we'll end up in Cube (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cube_(1997_film)). No one was having fun in that cyberpunk future.
> I fear the implementation details. Cameras are ~$15 and computer-vision is free. Let’s pray they’re not connected to Wi-Fi.
If it's not now, it will be soon. We need a new Moore's law for privacy. It states that anything that is private now, will be opened up and made public in the future if it can be monetized through advertisements. It starts with your biographical info on Facebook; it moves on to tracking your body through its location, how often it moves, its weight, and now urination in public places (soon there will be a scale under the urinal and they'll know how much you weigh); and it will end at your medical records, financial records, religious records, and even what you do in your bedroom. If the trend continues, if corporations can find a way to make money off of those records and data, it will be monetized and it will become public information when it's (of course) hacked and leaked.
This feels like an archetypal bad product idea I would have worked on in my contractor days.
It's always some dude. Usually they made money doing something else, and they had a (really dumb) idea one day, involving gamifying something, or putting ads somewhere, or both.
If by some miracle they get the right people around them, and don't just waste all their money, they can actually put something on the market. 99% of the time, it goes nowhere, once in a great while it does.
I'm not totally convinced this product will be a success — they are probably just burning runway.
But your overall point is valid, because there will always be some dude who will keep trying this kind of thing until eventually, by statistical oddity, it sticks. Then, it will stay around, and we'll be on to the next fresh hell.
You talk about a Moore's law for privacy. My mental model is more like a ratchet: it takes a some force to advance the mechanism, but once it clicks into place it is locked there forever. There's no going back, only forwards, so you should be extremely careful about anything that pushes you ahead.
> Soon it's going to get real, and we'll end up in Cube (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cube_(1997_film)). No one was having fun in that cyberpunk future.
I disagree. We always see cyberpunk dystopia stories from the lowly peasant consumer side, but I bet the people actively building the technology behind the dystopia are having fun. I know I would.
> a lot of people read cyberpunk fiction and didn't realize that it's a dystopia
People can be really dense but this is puzzling.
As Cyd Harrell says, "Cyberpunk was a warning, not an instruction manual."
Story time: I went to a small and pretty nerdy tech school (WPI), and there was an IRC channel at the time. One day I noticed that there were messages coming from a user named, IIRC, "compooper". Later I learned while visiting one of the regulars' student housing that they had an upstairs bathroom with an old vt-100 or somesuch wired to it. Not quite the same but got a laugh out of me :-)
I'm not too worried about the cameras.
Nobody wants to steal something which the market is saturated with already which is not only free, but sometimes seeks you out. (If you're a lady with a cell phone)
>Nobody wants to steal something which the market is saturated with already
The market is not saturated with authenticity.
I'm friends with a woman who's part of this discord group which is a bunch of other women who share unsolicited dick pics from other known discord users and gamers around and they all make fun of them
Weirdos will make demand for pictures of celebrities peeing, supply is only limited by the credibility of attribution.
It appears it just uses infrared sensors, not cameras.
After you play pee games, wash your hands, and buy something from their overwhelming collection of candies and nuts, you can visit the site of the first Del Taco restaurant a mile away:
There’s a lot of weird stuff between Vegas and CA! The weirdest one is an abandoned Nuclear bunker which I believe was built by AT&T 30ish years ago off Razor Road. Eddie World is up there too, something tells me not to trust a giant ice cream cone in the middle of nowhere :)
You can also find the ruins of an abandoned water park!
A giant ice cream cone in the desert, no less!
Eddie World has cleanest bathrooms and Tesla supercharging on the way to LV from both Bay Area as well as LA.
It can get crowded on weekends, but it’s a perfect stop off peak.
I sympathize with the article's criticism of all those things it mentioned but someone's gotta like it (gas stations, cigarettes, junk food, bible versus, lawyers, etc), otherwise it wouldn't be everywhere, and probably a whole lot of someones, perhaps even the majority of people.
> This is a true story. This actually happened.
> Everything in this essay exists.
I can't read this and believe that this article wasn't written by Nathan Fielder.
Unreal. Cameras in bathrooms are generally a no-no. Wouldn't this require consent from the user? Seems ripe for [legal] trouble, though the whole concept might be amusing to many.
I can confirm that only about half of my bathrooms are like this...
Leave it to the British to find a clever way to take the piss out of you. Just imagine the sit down toilet analog of this, timing your bowl movements to drop bombs out of planes. Explosive diarrhea? Extra points! At least you can feel good about that.
The piece is pretty hard to read; it is a little histrionic. I am guessing it's AI generated.
Also I am not sure how this bathroom is "cyberpunk" by having some screens in it. There's an Applebees here that has TVs in front of urinals. Cyberpunk is a genre of science fiction that is usually characterized by futuristic and dystopian elements. It also uses those elements to create a pessimistic satire of current society. This bathroom is neither futuristic nor dystopian, just trashy and kind of dumb.
Hasn't pee-hacking been covered hundreds of times on HN?
Two-ish hours from the largest city in the US is not the middle of nowhere. I know people who drive LA-LV on a weekly basis.
I once took an overnight bus trip from LA to Las Vegas. The bus must have left LA around 4am. We stopped at Eddie World somewhere around 6. It was a real experience waking up and being greeted by that place. It felt like an acid trip. I don't remember any games that I controlled with my dick, though.
What about this qualifies as cyberpunk?
Just a couple blocks away from that new Tesla charging spot, in the old part of Yermo, is the site of the original Del Taco.
Tita's Burger Den https://maps.app.goo.gl/AqY65SgTDcz23yrC9
What if I don't have to go long enough to finish the level? God, that must be annoying!
These games exist to lower the cost of cleaning. By motivating you to piss accurately, you spill less, meaning cleaning is quicker and can be done less frequently.
I've stopped at Eddie World at least half a dozen times, but I never needed to pee so I've missed out on this. I'll check it out next time.
I knew it! For ages I speculated that those blinking red lights on auto flushing urinals were part of a camera system taking pictures of men's junk for an FBI database. In fact, that was probably how they obtained the evidence they used against Michael Jackson in his child abuse case.
For better or worse, we've been living in the future, and it will probably get worse.
Buc-ee's should pay attention
I drive by that place almost every month; never stopped there though.
I pity the janitors that have to clean up after all the action
you can aim the tank with your pee stream
I knew this had to be about Eddie's World