This is the Modem World: Fear and loathing in the local bike shop [engadget]
By now, Cyber Monday is probably as big as Black Friday in terms of sales and retail excitement. According to IBM's Smarter Commerce arm, Cyber Monday online sales jumped 30 percent this year. A few years ago, Cyber Monday seemed to start as a joke, e-tailers heaving a "me too" at everyone returning to work, hoping to pick up a couple extra sales from those who didn't score on Black Friday.
This was, of course, when brick-and-mortar shops still outsold their online brethren. Blockbuster Video still occupied mini-malls; Barnes & Noble sold CDs and didn't know a thing about tablets. There was a quiet respect for brick-and-mortar stores in the quaint nature of Cyber Monday: 20 percent off underwear and free shipping, but that was about it.
While some venture out to the big stores to wrestle for a 32-inch, $149 LCD TV that they'd never buy any other day, the rest of us are content to stay home and pick off the good deals as they float by in cyberspace. We watch videos of seemingly normal people pummel one another in animalistic feeding frenzies just to get their hands on phones, socks and microwaves. And we say, "Yeah, no."
I'm one of the latter set: The notion of entering a store on Black Friday is about as appealing to me as a dentist appointment in the dead of winter, but I'm quite happy to pick off some good online deals.
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