The report canvassed Germany in search of its most unique Automats—discovering them in formats ranging from vintage photo-booths rescued, lovingly restored, and then installed by a pair of entrepreneurs in niches all over Berlin, including building lobbies—these simple and classic contraptions, which are not for passport-quality pictures, are proving wildly popular despite the fact that anyone with almost anything can take polished digital photos and make an omni-chronicle—to an out of the way coin-operated dispenser that a dairy farmer built that delivers fresh milk directly from a cow, robotically milked, to a promotional Automat in Kรถln’s train station that, in exchange for a good imitation of a cat’s meow, gives out a free sample of cat food. What sort of automated service would you invent? What convenience ideas from the past would you revive?
