McDonalds to Use DSes to Train Employees in Japan

[Valigarmander]

McDonalds to Use DSes to Train Employees in Japan

Trademark law may state that the slogan "It only does everything" can only be used by Sony to describe the PlayStation 3, but when we live in a world where the Nintendo DS can be used to train fast-food workers, we think Nintendo should have a legitimate claim to the description.

According to Japanese trade paper Nikkei (via Andriasang), McDonalds will indeed soon be using the DS to train their part-time employees in Japan, using a proprietary program called "eSmart" that they're developing themselves. This will mean installing around two DS handhelds in every McDonalds store in the country, which apparently totals 3,700 locations as of the end of February -- meaning as many as 7,400 DS handhelds McDonalds is about to purchase.

The total cost for this initiative (excluding the cost of developing the eSmart program) is said to come out to around 200 million yen ($2.2 million). But McDonalds expects the DS training system to save money by cutting training time by half compared to traditional methods, partly because of how familiar employees will already be with using a DS.

So for those of you keeping score, go ahead and jot this down as yet another small step toward the day when every single human interaction and task on Earth is conducted through a Nintendo DS touch screen.

I should get a job at a McDonalds in Japan.

[t3hDarkness]

The DS handhelds are probably cheaper than the normal training computers anyway.