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Technology: View from the top
Prime time online
Jim Moloshok just launched the multimillion-dollar Entertaindom portal. Can he create the successor to network TV?
By Susan Kuchinskas
[12/06/99]

Column
See spot run
Internet firms throwing big money at TV ad campaigns are making an elementary goof.
By Scott Rosenberg
[12/03/99]

Singing the MP3 blues
Indie musicians find online music distributors every bit as greedy as the recording industry they aim to replace.
By Emily Vander Veer
[12/02/99]

Sex sells, doesn't it?
Tales of financial chaos at the heart of an online porn empire.
By Mark Gimein
[12/01/99]

Technology: View from the top
The music man
MTVi's Nicholas Butterworth says he wants the audience to do the programming.
By Janelle Brown
[11/29/99]

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I look up from my computer when my eyes begin to ache: So far, I've clocked four hours just researching this stuff. There's a lot of information out there on the Web -- too much, in fact, for one amateur photographer to process. My hunting reaches the realm of the ridiculous when I realize that I am surfing simultaneously on two computers, with a total of 11 browser windows open to pages on four different Web sites. I've drawn up not one but two charts matching up the features of different cameras -- memory vs. battery life, picture quality vs. software, camera size vs. zoom -- and have two different comparison shopping engines simultaneously searching for the best prices. My quest for the definitive online information has shot an entire day.

My eyes are burning, my hands are cramping, my fingers are compulsively twitching away at the mouse. At this point, I give up and decide to trust MySimon -- I'll go with the Canon Powershot A50 Zoom or the Olympus D-450 Zoom. Both are small, simple, sturdy; they have optical zooms and sufficient memory, come highly recommended by several online sites and fall nicely within my price range. But I don't want to settle on one without being really sure about my decision.

I want to see them. Time to get away from my desk. Throwing my original goal to the wind, I head out to the garland-bedecked streets. This, they say, is why e-commerce will never replace bricks-and-mortar stores; consumers have a compulsive need to handle the merchandise before they buy. I'm no exception.

A quick lunchtime trot takes me to the local discount camera shop, and a gaggle of slick salesmen with exotic accents. I ask the man behind the counter to see the best cameras in my price range -- and, without hesitation, he hands me the exact two cameras I've been mulling online.

Hoping that the salesman might give me some expert advice, I ask for his recommendation. He holds up the Olympus; another salesman, a minute later, recommends the Canon. I throw up my hands in frustration. Besides, the prices are $100 higher than what I have been quoted online. I'm chased out of the store by a salesman, barking that he'll give me a "very big discount" if I'm willing to buy a camera on the spot.

Safely back in front of my computer, I give yet one more site a spin: Accompany.com. This site offers steep discounts on all kinds of products if you buy in bulk. If, for example, I can convince 12 people to buy the same camera, we'll all get fat discounts. One fancy Kodak camera, with two buyers signed up, has already been knocked down in price from $899 to $641. Unfortunately, Accompany's database of goods doesn't include any of the cameras I covet.

I briefly flirt with eBay, and decide that buying a digital camera from a stranger is just too risky. Back to the comparison engines.

At some point, I realize I've settled on the smaller, more stylish Canon. Several vendors are offering the camera for bargain-basement prices, according to the MySimon and CNET comparison-shopping engines, but the lowest quoted price, found via the CNET comparison shopper, comes from an online computer store I've never heard of. Despite assurances that the New Jersey mail-order company is a "CNET certified merchant," I can't convince myself to make the purchase.

The problem with shopping online is that any fly-by-night company can put up a decent-looking store, and you wouldn't know the difference. I look for reassurance: A quick search uncovers a site called 20-20 Consumer -- a kind of Better Business Bureau for the Web -- where customers can report on their experiences with various e-commerce sites. Sure enough, this little-known New Jersey store is listed, but its ratings reveal an unsettling number of dissatisfied customers. Instead, I decide to buy the camera at a slightly higher price from a more favorably reviewed company called PCWonders.

The finish line is within sight -- a cup of hot cocoa beckons. Within five minutes, I've bought the Canon camera online. It should arrive within two days. I can relax and enjoy the Christmas season.

Or can I?

Two days later, not only have I failed to receive the camera, I haven't even received an e-mail confirming the order. I call the store's customer support line and am told by an effusively apologetic service rep that my order never went through, thanks to a server glitch. "I need to do it again?" I ask, incredulously. He whispers: "Sorry."

This time, however, it works and the camera arrives, to my relief, as promised and in perfect condition.

The final tally: More than seven hours of online research, plus the half-hour trip to the camera store. Total cost: $324, plus $23 in shipping -- a deal compared with the roughly $500 I would have paid at the camera store. I now possess a voluminous library of knowledge about digital cameras and their features, more than I ever needed; had I merely walked into a Circuit City, I probably would have made the same choice with just a little bit of help from a salesman.

Still, it probably beats my typical Christmas shopping experience. I didn't run ragged from shop to shop, in hopes of finding a better deal. I didn't have to wait in a single line. And I haven't heard Jingle Bells once. More promisingly for the e-tailers, I saved a hell of a lot of money; savings, after all, are what consumers seem to want most of all.

Shopping online may be its own kind of hassle, and it probably won't halt the mass exodus to department stores any time soon. But if we can preserve the spirit of giving by making it less painful on the pocketbook, then I'm all for happy digital holidays.
salon.com | Dec. 7, 1999

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