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There are lots of reasons why a white elephant technology doesn’t catch on. Sometimes the technology is ahead of its time. In other cases, no amount of time can make a misguided technology useful or attractive. Then there’s vending machines that sell books. The first book-dispensing vending machine was built by Richard Carlile in England in 1822. Carlile was a bookseller who wanted to sell seditious works like Paine’s  Age of Reason  without being thrown in jail. His answer was a self service machine that allowed customers to buy questionable books without ever coming into contact with Carlile. The customer turned a dial on the devise to the publication he wanted, deposited his money, and the material dropped down in front of him. It’s unclear whether this was an automated process, but that didn’t stop England’s own automated process from convicting one of Carlile’s employees for selling “blasphemous material.” The Penguincubator The next book-dispensin...

A growing number of consumers are falling victims to pseudo-online merchants. Many shoppers on the Web are also bemoaning the poor quality of products and late deliveries. The National Consumer Complaints Centre (Malaysia) says it's about time outdated laws were amended to deal with present realities. E-commerce tops the sector with the most complaints received by the National Consumer Complaints Centre for two consecutive years. As more Malaysians turn to the Internet to purchase goods and services, there is a pressing need for an improved legal framework to protect their rights. ONLINE shoppers, beware. The e-commerce sector continues to top the list of complaints by Malaysian consumers, with the National Consumer Complaints Centre (NCCC) finding that an increasing number of Malaysians are falling victim to unscrupulous online merchants. These are mainly products offered by the merchants or direct-sellers who advertise them on social networking sites and online sho...

KUALA LUMPUR: A survey by telecommunication company Telenor Group has revealed how gullible Malaysians are on the Internet. With at least 46 per cent of respondents from this country having admitted to being a victim of Internet scams, Malaysia leads among the countries surveyed which included India, Singapore and Thailand. The study found that one in five Malaysians had been victims of both Internet auction scams and online dating scams. A quarter of Malaysians have experienced Internet auction fraud, The largest percentage of Malaysian scam victims however have fallen for the ‘work from home’ fraud, a scam whereby users are tricked into paying someone online to help them start a business or undertake work but end up not receiving any payment. One in 10 users in Malaysia also reported that their Facebook accounts had been hacked in the past. The multi-market survey assessed 400 Internet users aged 18 to 65 in Malaysia, India, Singapore and Thailand and was...