The Pitfalls of Shopping Online
To so many of us today, the computer is as much a part of our lives as the car, the coffee maker, or the washing machine.
In fact the very term “computer” is becoming somewhat dated. We use our lap-tops, our tablets, in fact the “smart phone” has pretty much been relegated back to just being a “phone” again.
We rarely, if at all consider the wonders of technology that these devices have become, and yet become so common place.
The wonder that was the World Wide Web, is rarely remarked upon these days, although billions of people daily across the globe employ it, there may be fleeting reference the “web”.
Has anything, (other than possibly bubonic plague), affected so many lives across the world in such a short space of time, the answer has to be no.
The answer is no, but what is so remarkable is that this miracle of science, has in such a short space of time, become so unremarked upon.
When the computer age dawned after the Second World War, and gathered pace in the sixties with the use of transistors, the computer was regarded with a certain amount of awe and wonder.
Today, the average smartphone would make those machines as relevant as the steam locomotive today.
Amid this mind-boggling change, which now draws little more than grumbles about broadband speeds, have grown changes in behaviour and customs, amongst which is the phenomena of online shopping.
On the face of it, it sounds a merely mundane progression of one of various online trends, but the structures that have grown out of, and around, and because of it are huge.
Today it seems perfectly natural, even second nature, to turn to the laptop or the tablet when something we may need or simply fancy arises.
Online shopping has grown to be an industry in part integrated with the high street and its associated brands, and online only outlets.
All are able to offer a range and variety of stock virtually impossible to match in bricks and mortar retail shops, for obvious reasons.
Additionally, shopping for services such as made to measure blind installations and the like have also shown a massive growth in popularity.
Real time shops will stock the lines that are most in demand and likely to sell. Online can cater for the outer fringes of market demands, and offer niche lines as a matter of course.
The industry has grown its own new chapters in courier delivery, and computer tracking can allow the customer to follow the progress of their purchase from the warehouse to their front door.