A new restaurant in New York City has ditched the phone and adopted a unique reservation system: the Internet. Momofuku Ko, a new French Asian restaurant (perhaps similar to our own new French Asian house, see Banq Restaurant) by famed chef David Chang, runs a no favor or hook-up gathering place.
The only way to land a spot is to log on to Ko’s web site, create an account, register with a credit card and take a shot at finding an empty space on a bingo-like grid. Seats are released at 10 a.m. everyday for the current seven-day period.
It wasn’t the intent to make people frustrated,” Chang said. “It was just something we thought would be easier. Why would we need a phone? People have the Internet. At the end of the day, it’s a silly, silly reservation system. But we have to be straight up. We are trying our best to make some system work that is not corruptible.”
Are people scalping reservations? Yes. But, Chang is not a fan of that,”I … loathe reservation scalpers,” Chang said. “I’d take a bat to their head if I could. You can quote me on that.”
Is this action by Chang a forerunner to relying exclusively on the Internet here in Boston, including other industries, such as Boston real estate? Time will tell.
Keith Munsell 
