AOL said in 1996 that computing was the biggest seller. PCs, modems, RAM, drives, storage, software. Business as usual for techies. Food was second place, which does make the eyebrows go up a little. Gifts, candy, flowers.
Apparel is down there with music and toys on the bottom.
Surprisingly, women on the Web don't favor browsing or surfing. They go directly to the sites they want and are very targeted, unlike their male counterparts who seem to enjoy browsing. Beyond the gender moves on the Web what we think the AOL data really indicates is that the Internet has taken giant strides from the realm of techies into a genuine mainstream shopping medium. Purchasing something after viewing it on a PC screen under the smallest of on-screen pictures and without any sense of touch requires a leap of faith on the buyer's part. From an investment perspective we therefore think Web shopping to be the most underhyped phenomenon.