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Archive for July 16th, 2009

Online IKEA Catalog

You’ve probably heard the name IKEA for years now, in association with the store that sells high quality furniture items at reasonable prices. But did you know that they also have a great online catalog that allows you to order items from their website to be shipped to a self-service manufacture. If you did and you use it then keep shopping. But if you didn’t, then welcome to the online IKEA Catalog.

IKEA USA is the United States affiliate to the IKEA brand and is a home furnishing company seeking to sell quality furniture at very reasonable prices. I knew they did quite well in their retail stores, but I wanted to take a look at their online catalog to see what they offered. In taking a tour of the online IKEA Catalog, I found that they offer pretty much everything including furniture for bedrooms, dining rooms, kitchens, living rooms, children’s bedrooms, workspaces and even laundry rooms. Some of the items they offer include leather sofas, side tables, shelving units, built-in kitchens, sinks, counter tops, dining tables and computer workstations in addition to extras like house plants, rugs and curtains. In short, they offer a LOT.

So how they next question that comes to mind is, “How are they able to make their online store work?” One way the online IKEA Catalog is successful is by cutting costs for you. And they’re able to do that by working with manufacturers who regularly produce high-quality furniture. Then they use buyers from around the world to seek out great raw materials. Lastly, they buy their materials in large quantities, helping them to get great deals for their customers!

Other ways they are able to sell their items at cheaper prices online is by packing their items flat, so that you can assemble them yourself when you get them home – a big cost-cutter. Also, they have you pick up the items at a self-service warehouse in your area. And the biggest cost reducer is having your order items online to avoid paying salesman at their own stores.

To see how cost-effective the online IKEA Catalog really is, I gave them my own test. I decided to see how well I could furnish my small apartment living room on a $1000 budget. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the results. Since my walls are boring white, I thought I would give the room a splash of color, so first I chose a beautiful Frasig Red leather loveseat for $499.00. Not bad. Next I found a very contemporary-looking leather armchair that I chose in a pretty off-white with a beech veneer frame for $199.00. Next I found a very cool steel-colored TV stand with space for a DVD player and stereo system for $59.00. Then I found an off-white, five-shelf bookcase to match my leather chair for $59.99. Still doing good! Lastly, I found a cool off-white coffee table for $44.99 with enough leftover for a $29.99 red and white area rug. Done! And at the end of the day, I spent $891.97 for leather furniture with nice accessories! Wow!

Now of course, I have to take into consideration that I might have to fork up quite a bit in shipping (I couldn’t find out the actual cost without entering real financial information), and I won’t know what level of quality I’m working with until I get the furniture home, but IKEA USA does offer a fully-refundable 90-day return policy on MOST items, so I can return what I don’t like. I must admit, after I designed my room, I wished I was buying with real money (rats!), but my game taught me that the online IKEA Catalog can work well if you’re ready to assemble on your own, which I am.

In the end, the online IKEA Catalog seems to be a good bet. But don’t just listen to me. Check as many reviews as you can from people who actually purchased items from them to know for sure that this is something you want to do. And ask representatives from IKEA questions directly. Use your purchasing power responsibly. It’s always better to be safe than sorry.

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AN OVERVIEW OF ONLINE GAMBLING

Now online: online gambling.

Just like any commercial market today, gambling also took its chance of having to saturate a broader area of gaming through the Internet.

Nowadays, there are as many online gambling games as there are gambling games. Every kind of gambling game has their online counter parts in the Web. From poker to sports betting, every gambling activity seems to be online.

Most proponents of online gambling assert that online gambling is just as safe as gambling in known casinos in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. Just like the usual casino, online casinos are also required to have their licenses and permits before engaging into online gambling.

By doing so, online casinos are systematically regulated and audited by professional firms. All online casinos use the secure e-cash facilities, in cooperation with the credit card companies, so that the customers are being protected from unauthorized use of credit cards or from cases of identity theft.

Generally, online gambling in an online casino will entice new players by requiring them to deposit an amount by offering bonuses. An online casino that will offer you a free $100 for a $50 deposit is a good example. In this manner, more people believe that online gambling offers better chances than real-life gambling. However, this poses more risk in getting addicted to the game.

For people who want to play online gambling, deposits can be made through credit cards, fire pay, or 900 pay. Fire pay works like an ordinary online debit card. Normally, the player places money into the account and can be spent to any online merchants. Funds can be deposited through wire transfers. 900 pay, on the other hand, is another way of depositing money by calling a 900 number and the amount that is to be deposited is charged to the player’s phone bill.

What’s more, online casinos are further classified into two groups based on their interface. Online casinos could either be web-based or download-based.

Web-based casinos are forms of online gambling wherein users may directly play online casino games without having to load any software to the local computer. Online gambling is mainly presented in the browser plugins like Macromedia Flash, Shockwave, or Java.

On the other hand, download-based online casinos are the most common online gambling sites in the Web. Here, online gambling users have to download certain software in order to play the casino games. And because it has pre-downloaded software, it is faster to initiate casino games on it compared to web-based casinos.

All the same, and due to the basic nature of online gambling, any transactions with it are vulnerable to fraud. There are online gambling known as rogue casinos wherein these sites refuse to pay the customers or contains a cheating software.

Plus, there are other ways of frauds in online gambling. Most of these cases are player-based. Players who want to cheat usually uses Adobe Photoshop or a comparable tool to maneuver the graphics of a slot machine screenshot in order to deceive the casino into thinking that the player just hit a jackpot.

Whatever forms of deception, it is evident that frauds are more likely to happen in online gambling. And if in any case, players get to be addicted in playing online gambling, they must remember that their obsession did not happen by mistake.

Online gambling is a highly interactive game, meaning whatever choices players make are based on their own prerogatives. So, however enticing online gambling can be it is a must that players must know their own dispositions so as not to be deceived.

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