It's a paradox: restaurant owners are often disdainful/fearful of technology, so they are the most easily swindled when it comes to understanding a value equation involving technology.
Pretty funny. Although I kinda hoped it was something else. Like a cool point of sale system that could be extended by its operators to provide fun new functionality with an intuitive graphical interface.
I'd guess, as a co-owner of a shop myself, that the reason medium sized retailers spend a lot on POS is the same reason they don't represent themselves in court. It looks easy, you might get away with doing it cheaper, but there's a lot that can go wrong and a lot at stake if things don't pan out. Paying someone to pull you out of a hole is more expensive than paying someone else to dig it in the first place.
Scale it up a bit, and it's the same reason a lot of enterprises buy Oracle (or other big expensive proprietary software) when OSS alternatives would be suitable.... they want someone to call (or worst case, blame) when problems arise.
This article is well-meaning but totally misses the point:
It doesn't matter if your POS is built on open source technology if someone has the ability to install new software onto it.
i.e. UltraSecureAwesomeClosedSourceOS is just as vulnerable to having new (rogue) software installed onto the device as any other OS. The hardware or firmware should have controls in place to prevent this or make it extremely difficult, regardless of what is running on top.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 28.6 ms ] threadIt doesn't matter if your POS is built on open source technology if someone has the ability to install new software onto it.
i.e. UltraSecureAwesomeClosedSourceOS is just as vulnerable to having new (rogue) software installed onto the device as any other OS. The hardware or firmware should have controls in place to prevent this or make it extremely difficult, regardless of what is running on top.