The Matter of Menu Section Scanning
A person opens a delivery app menu and reads through sections they have already decided not to order from. The section they intend to order from is not reached until the others have been assessed.
Official Application for Menu Section Scanning Relief Submitted on Behalf of: A User Who Knows What They Want
Statement of the Matter
The undersigned has used food delivery applications regularly for approximately two years. During this period, the undersigned has developed a consistent ordering preference that does not require exploration of the full menu. The preference is known. The section is known. The item is, in most cases, known before the application is opened.
The undersigned nonetheless reads several sections before reaching the intended one. This application requests acknowledgment that the practice is understood.
Evidence of the Practice
On the occasion in question, the undersigned opened an application intending to order from the rice section. The application opened to the Recommended section. The undersigned scrolled through Recommended. Recommended contained nothing new. The undersigned moved to the Starters section.
The undersigned does not want starters. The undersigned reviewed four items in the Starters section with sufficient attention to read their descriptions, though not sufficient attention to consider ordering any of them. The undersigned then proceeded to the Soup and Salad section.
The process continued for an additional two sections before the undersigned reached Rice.
The Observation
Menu section scanning is the practice of reviewing categories that are not under active consideration before arriving at the category that is. The undersigned does not want the biryani section. The undersigned has been in the biryani section for three minutes.
The Reluctant Finding
The scan is not entirely without purpose. It confirms, at each section, that the original intention remains correct. Passing through the Noodles section and finding nothing of interest is not wasted time in the strict sense. It is evidence that the undersigned's preference is stable, which is a form of information.
This information was already available without reviewing the noodles. The review confirms it anyway.
The Governing Contradiction
Several delivery applications have introduced a search function. The search function locates any item across all sections without requiring the user to scroll through the intervening categories. The undersigned is aware of the search function. The undersigned has used the search function. The undersigned continues to scroll through sections.
The section scan persists alongside the search function as if both serve different purposes. The purposes are, in fact, the same. Only one of them is efficient.
The Absurd Rule
When a new restaurant is added to the application, the undersigned reads the entire menu before ordering. This is reasonable for a new restaurant. After the third order from the same restaurant, the full-menu reading should no longer be necessary. It continues regardless. The undersigned reads the Beverages section of every restaurant, despite never ordering a beverage from a delivery application.
Request
The undersigned requests no specific relief. The practice is its own resolution. The undersigned will reach the Rice section. It will take somewhat longer than necessary. This is the current state of the matter.