Fear of being without your phone. Do you feel anxious if your cellphone isn't nearby?
Does just the thought of losing your phone make your heart pound? Do you keep an extra phone on hand, just in case your primary phone breaks? Do you sometimes take it to bed with you? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you may be a nomophobe, and you are not alone. Nomophobia -- the fear of being without your cellphone -- is on the rise, according to a new report sponsored by SecurEnvoy, a company that specializes in digital passwords. Using the online polling service OnePull, SecurEnvoy found that 66% of the 1,000 people surveyed in the United Kingdom say they fear losing or being without their phone. Just four years ago a similar survey found that only 53% of people suffered from nomophobia (no-mobile-phobia). Back then, men were more likely to fear being without their phones, but today women are more concerned about being disconnected. People 18-24 tend to be the most nomophobic (77%), followed by people aged 25-34 (68%). The NPD Group Reports on the Trend of “Showrooming” for the Home.
Port Washington, NY, February 29, 2012 – There is evidence in the home retail sector that consumers first research a product in the brick and mortar store and then make their actual purchase online – it is a practice known as, “showrooming.”
According The NPD Group, Inc., a leading market research company, 15-20 percent of consumers in 2011 were “showrooming” categories like stand mixers, electric knives, sewing machines, and some floor cleaners. Other categories like power tools, hairsetters, and robotic vacuums are now beginning to show signs of the “showrooming” trend as well. The NPD Group, Inc. / Consumer Tracking Service shows that in total small kitchen electrics, seven percent of consumers who researched their product in a brick and mortar store made their purchase online.
Within personal care, that number is four percent, and in home improvement, two percent. “We are a long way off from a world of online-only shopping. Online sales are on the rise. The Un-Internet. Top 10 Misused English Words. Humans Many people who’ve had to proof read documents start to develop a kind of compulsive “tutting” at misused words.
Here’s my top ten words that are misused by either professional writers or public speakers who, let’s be honest, should really know better. I’m not being paid for this, so I don’t feel so bad if there are mistakes! “Refute” means to “disprove with evidence” and yet it’s commonly used, even by professional writers, to mean “rebut” which carries a similar meaning but isn’t quite so strong, as it can also mean “argue against.” The example here (“Simon Cowell refutes ‘scandalous’ claims he helped billionaire hide assets from wife he was divorcing”) is from a recent Daily Mail article. Nowadays, it’s almost universally assumed that “instant” actually means “quickly” or “without intervention.”