Better and More Enjoyable on the Web: Black Friday

This year’s Black Friday made a major push to the web.

I remember the first time I decided to brave the crowds for Black Friday, the official first shopping day of the holiday season. I had to drop my wife (girlfriend at the time) off at the airport for an early morning flight, so I decided I may as well stop in at the electronics store for a few deals.

What I saw was a joke. The shameless consumerism of America. People lined up a hundred deep hours in advance, only to push and shove each other inside a store to save $50 on a TV. I decided then an there that it was only worth dealing with Black Friday if you were going to save a number of hundred dollars on a big ticket purchase.

Some things were different this year. First, bricks and mortar stores broke ranks with prior years by pre-announcing their specials a number of days in advance. Second, almost all major online stores had specials of their own that were actually good. (In past years they had deals but nothing to rival physical stores). The online stores also extended the specials well ahead of Friday; I picked up a James Bond DVD for $2.00 on Amazon yesterday.

Today, following many years of skipping the Black Friday activities, I found myself an unwilling participant. I tried to put up our Christmas lights yesterday only to find that the record Austin heat destroyed most of them in summer storage. (Perhaps the attic wasn’t the best place to store them.) So I had to visit Target to pick up some fresh ones.

Thankfully, I picked the right Target store. No lines, no pushy people. And when I checked out, I got an unanticipated little surprise. The cashier handed me a $10 gift card. “This is for spending $100 or more ahead of noon,” she stated.

If only I could use that gift card for a domain registration.