Although the product is still being analyzed in test homes, analysts say that they do not think the Web Pad will make the desktop computer obsolete, as the test homes had to be equipped with a radio wire connecting the pad to a desktop machine with a phone line allowing Internet access. The Web Pad also lacks a standard keyboard, although a digital image of a keyboard can be downloaded on the pad and can be typed on by using a special pen. Online retailers have found that electronic commerce is no more cost effective than operating traditional retail stores. Shipping creates some difficulties as well, as much of the attraction of online shopping is that buyers hope the products will arrive more quickly than catalogue orders. In the new network economy, space is no longer a limiting factor for business.
Companies can communicate with their customers regardless of their physical location.
Some experts forecast that this defining feature of the new economy will be the end of the middleman, but this is unlikely to happen. Traditional middlemen such as travel agents and stockbrokers will indeed become irrelevant and will need to change their roles to survive, but for every intermediary that is eliminated, a new breed is created. The economics of space have given way to the economics of attention, as many companies have become successful with direct-sales links to their customers but now must find some way of attracting consumers' attention amid the hordes of vendors online. This new breed of intermediary informs and advises customers, in order to simplify their dealings with suppliers and service providers. Their goal is to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of transactions in the networked economy.