By the end of the read I was wondering why I can't setup a few vending machines, sit back and watch the profits roll in. I know it's likely more complicated that I imagine, but it seems like such a hands off way to manage commerce. It wraps up inventory management and sales into one convenient package and takes out the daily responsibilities.

Someone has to bring up japanese vending machines. They are sort of amazing.That said, I've seen more weird giant vending machines in airports nowadays, the memorable ones to me selling all kinds of lego sets.

The amount of complex software running these now is insane, yet they still manage to consistently fail on card readers.