New ways to spend MORE money.

Over the last few years I have found myself buying more and more stuff online. At first there was something I wanted to buy online, a pair of shoes that were several hundred dollars in New Zealand and only forty in America, this was enough to tip me over the edge to acquire a credit card. Once this step has been reached and you have received your first online order, it is rather easy to descend into a degenerate cycle of blissful consumerism from the comfort of your own home. It seems that you can buy anything on the Internet these days, and usually cheaper than you can find in retail stores or the equivalent and, then you have the excitement of the anticipation of the parcel of stuff on its way to your door. The amount of products and services that are available online has been increasing as more and more people are getting over the fear of purchasing goods online and taking the plunge. Once the first order has been made, then it is very convenient to continue ordering goods online. If you didn’t want to you wouldn’t even have to go to the supermarket.

Not only are physical goods being sold online, but also various forms of media are now available in a purely digital form online. It is now possible to hire out movies online and either stream or download them in high definition. There is the Steam games network, which allows you to purchase various computer games, often at a much cheaper price than retail. Rather than being sent out a copy of the computer game, it becomes bound to your account and you can play it on any computer you wish, by logging into your account and downloading it. Then there is the Magic the Gathering. Magic is a card game that requires continuing card purchases cards to be able to compete in the game effectively. It is a rather unfortunate addiction I acquired, and one that got a little more unfortunate recently when I tried out the online version of the game. There are also websites that use the freemium model discussed during one of the lectures. This model means that some aspects of a product or service are free, but to tap the full potential out of it, you have to pay for it.

The question must be asked, how will all of this online consumption going to affect the way things work in the physical world? It is clear that many companies are going to fail and many more people are going to lose their jobs. The trend can already be seen, as formerly successful news and media companies, video rental stores and many other companies are collapsing. Even companies that deal in physical wares are finding it difficult competing with online outlets, which cut out the need of retail staff, allowing them to sell their products at a lower price. It will be interesting to see where things will end up, but for now I am going to go back to playing Magic Online.