Achievers
Books
Business
Calendar
Community
Controversy
Cuisine
Eateries
Education
Enterprise
Faith
Good Samaritans
Health
Infotech
Media
Memories
Movies
News Archives
Opinion
Specials
The Arts

Sundari Josyula

The new middleman

A few months ago, ABC's Good Morning America sponsored the first live E-cave experiment. Volunteers were to be locked up in an empty apartment (read, cave) with a bed, an empty refrigerator and a live computer for five days. The goal was to see if it is possible to survive on a $ 500 daily stipend and an Internet connection.

A week later, the first two volunteers, Darryl Hollar and Leslie Firtell, had become minor celebrities. They had done it, depending only on their ingenuity and the infinite riches of the World Wide Web. Not only did they live off food and drink delivered by online delivery services, each managed to pack their respective 'caves' with lots of goodies from online stores using only their computer. And not just with basic necessities such as furniture, clothing, electronics, bed linen and wall hangings. Leslie was even able to arrange for facials, massages and a personal trainer to come to the apartment and work out with her!! All this without setting foot outside the apartment!!

What made this possible? The ongoing boom in e-commerce and Internet-related ventures, of course. Now there are stores for all kinds of things appearing on the virtual highway. Gone are the days when the Internet was only for checking email, chatting, or garnering information. Every day new sites are springing up with a range of products for sale and offering incentives like free delivery to attract customers.

The e-caving experiment went a step further by implying that maybe there is no need to even step out of the house to shop. The resulting national attention meant that e-commerce had finally arrived on Main Street, USA. Everyone was starting to sit up and take notice.

Imagine! No more rushing around on weekends to get errands done! No need to battle rush-hour traffic and fight for parking slots at the post office. And best of all, no need to go all the way to the grocery store to find they are all out of your favorite ice-cream. Is this really possible or just some futuristic fantasy?

The hype itself is nothing new. We have all heard of the phenomenal success of Amazon.com. The company has become practically synonymous with books and CDs. Or checked out car prices at Autobytel.com in an idle moment of curiosity. Every few months, the advertising frenzy starts, usually coinciding with the major holidays. Get your holiday hopping out of the way, the easy painless way! This year gift giving is easier than ever before! And so on.

But TV hoopla aside, it set me wondering. Exactly what impact has the Internet had on the daily lives of ordinary families? A discreet peek into several Silicon Valley homes made me realise that the Internet is changing the way people do things in a very fundamental way.

Picture this. You are an overworked housewife just about to feed your seven-month-old dinner when you realise that you are looking at the last two jars of baby food. To make matters worse your husband is travelling this week on business and you don't know how to drive. What do you do? After putting your baby to bed, you just log on to the Web site of a local online grocery and select all the baby food you want.

While at it, you remember that toothpaste you've been meaning to pick up and throw in some fresh vegetables, juice, milk and cans of yogurt as well. You select the earliest delivery time and type in your home address. Chances are, within 24 hours the company would have delivered your order to your doorstep and charged your credit card only after you accepted the goods.

Or check this out. While travelling on a two-week business trip you realise that because of a cancelled meeting, you have a free weekend to kill. You remember the old roommate in a neighbouring state you've been meaning to hook up with forever, but never managed to. Instead of moldering away in your hotel room wishing you had done some advance planning, what can you do? Well, you can get your friend to look up the cheapest airfares on the Web and charge the ticket price to your credit card. If your friend chooses the electronic ticket option while making the purchase, the ticket will be waiting for you when you arrive at the airport. All you do is produce your driver's licence at the counter and verify your identity to be able to make the trip.

Or how about this? You are a young programmer perpetually working late on deadline-driven projects. You haven't seen the inside of your apartment in days and you shudder at the thought of tackling that huge pile of unattended mail on the kitchen counter. Every month you have to make a special effort to remember to get bills paid in time. And lately it's becoming a losing battle. Now you just don't want to deal with the hassle anymore. Here's one option. Instead of paying a fortune in late fees, you can enrol with one of the online bill-paying services. For a monthly fee, they'll pay all your bills for you, so you never need to worry about being late again on your credit card or mortgage payments.

Oh, but you are concerned about hackers misusing your bank account number. Or you just don't want to pay someone else to do your bills. Security is a big concern these days. But there are ways out. Most banks are probably online these days, especially if it's a branch of a nationwide chain. By logging into a secure, password-protected area of their Web site you can check your balance, cheques that were cleared recently, etc. You can also set up a recurring payment schedule with your online bank account for fixed payments made monthly, like rent or mortgages or cable bills. Now you can check to make sure your bills are paid at any time of the day or night.

You hate spending your precious Saturday afternoons shopping. Tramping down endless malls looking for clothes, electronics, books, CDs or DVDs just isn't your idea of fun. First you have to get the whole family ready, then use all your skill and cunning to find decent parking. Even if you do go shopping, you invariably come home to find out you have forgotten some small but essential item like underwear.

Well, now you have an alternative. There are tons of clothing stores online, right from the specialty stores to department stores to traditional catalogue sellers-turned-online stores.

In an effort to render themselves more competitive (read attractive) many online stores offer perks not normally available. For example, some stores offer to hem your pants or jeans to the exact length you want -- free. Sometimes their overstock section has good markdowns and clearance prices too. Electronics are obtainable for a bargain at innumerable places. And let's face it, clicking on different Web sites to comparison-shop is a lot easier on the feet that running from one store to another.

Are you the type that always forgets you are out of stamps? And that really important packet or letter needs to go, like, today? And usually you discover this at some really propitious time like 9pm or 7am? Even the US postal service has recognised the trend and gone online with stamps.com. This is a US postal service-approved site where you can print out your own stamps at home, for a small fee, of course. You do need a printer, however. You can even do priority mail or express delivery. No more running to the post office at the last minute for stamps. And this way you can print out as many stamps as you need whenever you want. Weekends, weekday evenings, middle of the night, whenever.

And the list is getting longer each day. Are you a busy professional who invariably forgets to pick up dry-cleaning till after closing time? In many areas there are now laundry and dry-cleaning services that do pick-ups and drop-offs to your office or home.

Want tickets to a movie or concert? Renew library books? Buy your niece a birthday present? Send your loved one flowers? Find a service to walk your pet? Read as many newspapers and magazines as you want? Rent a car for your vacation? Check out the latest musical offerings by your favourite singer? Plan your garden landscaping and exchange tips with other gardeners?

In fact the computer has become a necessity rather than a luxury. Just can't do without it.

In the past there were only a few ways you could reasonably cope with all the demands and responsibilities of modern living. Either you had to be very rich and able to hire servants to run around and get all these things done. In other words, outsource. But sometimes they wouldn't show up or they wouldn't understand what needed to happen correctly or they would just slack off and do a careless job.

Or you had to be part of a large family, maybe even a joint family or communal setup where these tasks could be divided among the many adult members. Hopefully, these adults would be more responsible than the hired help, but then different issues like personalities and family dynamics might arise.

If you were neither of the above, you did what you could and ignored the rest. Especially in the West, where you have only yourself or your spouse to rely on, simply raising a family and day-to-day issues could exert quite a toll in terms of stress. Until the Internet entered the picture.

The Web has created a new type of middleman. By doing away with the traditional agents or third parties and simplifying the hierarchy. Physical dependence on a person, self, family members or hired help to accomplish drudge tasks is no longer necessary.

In fact, if you make up a list of all the errands that a functional household could require and went through each item, I'm sure you will be able to find a way of doing all of them online using your computer. In every instance, the convenience and flexibility, the ability to order goods at any time of day or night and accept home delivery have made the Internet alternatives to the marketplace more attractive.

While just a few months ago this whole concept was revolutionary enough to make headlines on top news programs like ABC's Good Morning America, now it barely raises an eyebrow. But then that's the speed of the Internet revolution.

Next: The punching bag

Tell us what you think of this column