Internet access anytime, from anywhere, means you can shop for shoes or find a doctor at 2 a.m. Some 800 numbers also offer 24-hour service. The difference is, instead of reading your order to a person on the other end of the telephone, you're doing all the work yourself, saving money for the company from whom you're buying goods or services and satisfying yourself by browsing and buying at your own pace. What's more, Internet immediacy is reaching far beyond individual consumers as businesses find ways to increase their efficiency via the Internet. Companies with no retail business are using websites to allow outsiders in.
Customers can check the status of a shipment.
Suppliers can better manage manufacturing schedules. Some of the Internet's promise remains to be realized. Clicking on websites can test one's patience as narrow bandwidth and slow processors make for lots of thumb twiddling while screens fill. Skeptics point to the two-thirds of American households that have no computers as evidence that online culture is not as ubiquitous as Net heads would have us believe. But if one considers how many of those households include someone who accesses the Internet from a computer at work, the picture changes.