The only word I can use to describe the feeling I got when ordering my Mac from Outpost.com at 10pm on a Tuesday and unwrapping it at 8:30am on Wednesday is "deeply satisfied." Oh sure, I hate the color, but I knew what I was getting into beforehand. Large purchases demand that kind of tactile satisfaction, and a nap and a stroll to the office was far more pleasant than standing in line to get assistance in store at CompUsa. Plus I saved a few bucks.

At a certain point though, online shopping becomes less about tools to improve our day and methods of shopping that allow us more information and time to make decisions and more about hiding the shame of our conspicuous consumption from others. It's about selling things we don't need in boom time and making the process as painless as possible. No need to be ashamed of buying a "collectible" lunchbox for $100.00 if nobody sees it happen but you. How many of us now know our UPS man by name that didn't two years ago?

The cycle of greed is a lot like the tigers in the now banned book "Little Black Sambo." They chase each other's tails, running oin a circle at the same speed until they eventually melt into butter. We are sold things as fast as we can buy them, becuase we're earning more money than we are familiar with earning and feel like we have to show people how good things have gotten. Pretty soon we'll go broke, the sellers will have no one to sell to and soilent green will be made of people.

I'm glad that things are shifting towards the spend less time online model, which I've been advocating as long as I can remember. What we can't buy with one click ordering though, is a life. We can feather our nests, feed our faces, and buy swizzle sticks to stir our cerebral cortex with, we can even buy time rom another person,but we can't buy time, respect or the lovely feeling you get when you can sit in a room with someone for hours and not say anything. All this communication is depriving us of the most basic of human comfort, security.

I'm not saying it's all bad, or that I don't like it. I'm just saying that

heidi@smug.com

back to the junk drawer