[Tenoke]

Yeah, I don't understand what he even means.

>a way to order fast food on your cellphone.

>[...]So it was not going to happen. It still doesn't exist, 19 years later.

How does this not exist?? If there was a further problem with their idea why did he describe it in the way of something that not only exists but is super popular? Has he grown completely out of touch or what's going on?

[rhplus]

What they were probably pitching 19 years ago would have been ordering via SMS on basic phones, most likely via USSD codes. That’s why he mentioned contracts with cell networks, as they’d need to secure numbers and codes.

That model absolutely has taken off, just not in places where everyone has smartphones. USSD services - driven by basic text menus - powers everything from microtransactions to ordering food to accessing government services in many parts of Africa to this day:

https://africastalking.com/ussd

[arrowsmith]

I took it to mean "an app like this created by Steve and Alexis still doesn't exist."

It gave me pause though, as it's a weird way to phrase it.

[emnudge]

I'm pretty sure he knows what Doordash is. I assume the thing that doesn't exist is ordering via a phone line, not an internet-based interface.

i.e. texting or calling a number in a specific way based on some standard tons of fast food places provide to make fast food orders without human interaction.

[theGnuMe]

I've seen text to order food where you pay at pickup. There seem to be some systems out there.

https://www.usfoods.com/our-services/business-trends/text-to...

[Tenoke]

It still seems pretty disingenuous to say it doesn't exist even today just because we do the same thing with better tech today - very likely what their hypothetical company would've ended up doing, same as Netflix or Twitter embracing the technology for their use cases and moving away from DVDs and SMS.

[HaZeust]

I really think he's trying to pussyfoot around his poorly-aged claim by changing the goalpost. Even in 2005, with Domino's order tracker, it was still a purposely-contrarian stance on what technology would allow us to do with food ordering in the near future. If this is considered a hill to die on, that's embarrassing.