A. “A mad scientist.”
Q. “What’s another name for the “Intel Inside” sticker they put on Pentiums?”
A. “The warning label.”
Maintaining to the end that this was more of a marketing problem than a technical one, Intel relented. It agreed to replace chips for free without interrogating the public. What’s more, Intel expanded its presence on the Net. It now offered a nice area on the World Wide Web with items ranging from product descriptions to job announcements. Still, this fiasco aside, Intel had a good reputation for quality control, and by not shrinking from the Net community, it was responding correctly.
Another major lesson should also have sunk in among marketers of all kinds—beyond the obvious fact that the Internet could spread news of flawed products. Customers throughout the world could use the same channels to find out about geographically based price gouges. If a software firm charged reasonable prices in the United States but boosted price tags for Europeans, then the Net would spread the word. Software companies might not appreciate this immediately, but sooner or later they would. This was especially true of companies sending their products over the Net. The Internet Adapter, the product that had proven to be so good to my wallet, would have cost me $25 even if I’d lived in Antarctica or New Zealand. I wondered how long it would be before the traditional vendors of shrink-wrapped software would understand this lesson and stop squeezing customers outside the United States. Even with the expenses of middle people and translation factored in, the prices of some American software products were too high in Europe. Consumerism on the Net just might make the marketplace more sane.
Other Hazards For Business People
Not surprisingly, the old sixties people saw the Internet as a victory of smallness over big corporations. Little companies could use the Net in new and imaginative ways and woo prospects thousands of miles away. Some enthusiasts promoted the Net as a powerful weapon for individuals who hated life in sluggish, bloated corporations.
Still, the Net might not always be a Nirvana for small entrepreneurs. Consider the Lilienfelds. What if toy companies decided to sell on the Net directly, for example? The Lilienfelds themselves could still fare well since they were working hard to become known for personal service. For example, if a toy weren’t shown online, Bob might even scan in a photo from a wholesaler’s catalogue and e-mail it to an interested buyer. And he and his wife were planning to make themselves a conspicuous presence in relevant newsgroups, while respecting netiquette. But not all of the small merchants would be as astute and dedicated. I suspected that many bankruptcies lay ahead.
Other problems might hit large as well as tiny companies. Many customers refused to give their credit card numbers online; in fact, many stores didn’t even want them. The Net wasn’t entirely secure. Theoretically, snoops in a number of locations could intercept orders and pick up the MasterCard or VISA numbers with software that looked for common data associated with credit cards. I regarded this as a temporary problem. Lilienfeld had dealt with it nicely by letting people—at least those in the United States—phone in their credit card numbers for free. The numbers would remain safe in White Rabbit’s computers, ready for future transactions. Besides, as Lilienfeld pointed out, it wasn’t worth the trouble for thieves to keep a tab on small stores like his.
Bigger businesses, however, were right to worry, and solutions were on the way. Popular browsers such as Netscape, for example, were coming with security features. Customers would be able to effortlessly transmit their credit card numbers in encoded form.