According to this article The Disintermediation Blues On the sad state of online car- and mortgage-buying services “Back when the dot-com boom was peaking, there was a lot of talk about how online services would blow away their anachronistic bricks-and-mortar competitors. Some of that has happened. Amazon.com, for example, has played a key role in forcing many local bookstores to close up shop. But many other targeted lines of business have been far less successful. The missing ingredients in many of those areas are top executives who understand the human, rather than the technical, factors required for success.” [ia/ – news for information architects]