Odds and Ends
I hope you all had a happy holiday. If you are selling anything on the web, I hope you benefited from Cyber Monday (November 27). That was the day that supposedly marked the peak for online holiday shopping. However, according to MasterCard’s worldwide data for 2005, a survey of the members of the online retail group Shop.org found that their busiest day last year was December 12.
Since time must be allowed for shipping, online retailers must complete sales earlier than brick and mortar stores. Because of that, online retailers are promoting earlier shopping with special promotions and discounts. This year free shipping seems to be popular with the buyers, and many online merchants are offering that to attract them.
Also according to the MasterCard report, about three out of four shoppers plan to shop online, and they expect to spend $300 out of a total holiday spend of $700 each.
A significant amount of that shopping is taking place at work, according to a separate survey of customers conducted by Shop.org. About three-fourths of 18 to 24 year olds and 66.4 percent of 25 to 34 year olds plan to browse or buy online while at work. According to the report, people who shopped on a work computer said they did it before work, after work, or during their lunch break.
(From: “Cyber Monday more myth than reality?” November 20, 2006, 2:08 PM PST
by Candace Lombardi, Staff Writer, CNET NEWS.com)
Google is offering all kinds of goodies for your web site! Examples include: Google Maps, Calendars, Date and Time, Weather, Games, Wikipedia search, driving directions, stock charts, YouTube, loan calculators, lottery results, and hundreds of other options. To see what you can do, go to: http://www.google.com/ig/directory?synd=open
As discussed in earlier e-mails, the Internet was developed primarily as a tool to ensuring communications would continue in the event of nuclear war or other catastrophe. It’s ironic, then, that the Business Roundtable has released a report entitled, “Essential Steps to Strengthen America’s Cyber Terrorism Preparedness: New Priorities and Commitments from Business Roundtable’s Security Task Force”. The introduction states that, “The Internet and its communications infrastructure serve as the critical backbone of the information exchange that is vital to our nation’s security and our economy. Yet the United States is not sufficiently prepared for a major attack, software incident or natural disaster that would lead to disruption of large parts of the Internet.”
This report is available in PDF form that is readable by Acrobat Reader. If you do not already have the free reader, you can download it here: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html
The Business Roundtable report can be found here: http://www.businessroundtable.org/pdf/20060622002CyberReconFinal6106.pdf
The last two links (Google Gadgets and the Business Roundtable) were gleaned from one of my favorite sources for obscure net info, the weekly newsletter from librarian Marylaine Block. The newsletter is called, “Neat New Stuff” and you can sign up at the site below: http://marylaine.com/neatnew.html
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