title: Mary Shelley

text: Between 1832 and 1839, Mary Shelley wrote many biographies of notable Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and French men and a few women for Dionysius Lardner's "Lives of the Most Eminent Literary and Scientific Men". These formed part of Lardner's "Cabinet Cyclopaedia", one of the best of many such series produced in the 1820s and 1830s in response to growing middle-class demand for self-education. Until the republication of these essays in 2002, their significance within her body of work was not appreciated. In the view of literary scholar Greg Kucich, they reveal Mary Shelley's "prodigious research across several centuries and in multiple languages", her gift for biographical narrative, and her interest in the "emerging forms of feminist historiography". Shelley wrote in a biographical style popularised by the 18th-century critic Samuel Johnson in his "Lives of the Poets" (1779–81), combining secondary sources, memoir and anecdote, and authorial evaluation. She records details of each writer's life and character, quotes their writing in the original as well as in translation, and ends with a critical assessment of their achievement.


title: Mary Shelley

text: For Shelley, biographical writing was supposed to, in her words, "form as it were a school in which to study the philosophy of history", and to teach "lessons". Most frequently and importantly, these lessons consisted of criticisms of male-dominated institutions such as primogeniture. Shelley emphasises domesticity, romance, family, sympathy, and compassion in the lives of her subjects. Her conviction that such forces could improve society connects her biographical approach with that of other early feminist historians such as Mary Hays and Anna Jameson. Unlike her novels, most of which had an original print run of several hundred copies, the "Lives" had a print run of about 4,000 for each volume: thus, according to Kucich, Mary Shelley's "use of biography to forward the social agenda of women's historiography became one of her most influential political interventions".


title: Mary Shelley

text: Soon after Percy Shelley's death, Mary Shelley determined to write his biography. In a letter of 17 November 1822, she announced: "I shall write his life—& thus occupy myself in the only manner from which I can derive consolation." However, her father-in-law, Sir Timothy Shelley, effectively banned her from doing so. Mary began her fostering of Percy's poetic reputation in 1824 with the publication of his "Posthumous Poems". In 1839, while she was working on the "Lives", she prepared a new edition of his poetry, which became, in the words of literary scholar Susan J. Wolfson, "the canonizing event" in the history of her husband's reputation. The following year, Mary Shelley edited a volume of her husband's essays, letters, translations, and fragments, and throughout the 1830s, she introduced his poetry to a wider audience by publishing assorted works in the annual "The Keepsake".


title: Mary Shelley

text: Evading Sir Timothy's ban on a biography, Mary Shelley often included in these editions her own annotations and reflections on her husband's life and work. "I am to justify his ways," she had declared in 1824; "I am to make him beloved to all posterity." It was this goal, argues Blumberg, that led her to present Percy's work to the public in the "most popular form possible". To tailor his works for a Victorian audience, she cast Percy Shelley as a lyrical rather than a political poet. As Mary Favret writes, "the disembodied Percy identifies the spirit of poetry itself". Mary glossed Percy's political radicalism as a form of sentimentalism, arguing that his republicanism arose from sympathy for those who were suffering. She inserted romantic anecdotes of his benevolence, domesticity, and love of the natural world. Portraying herself as Percy's "practical muse", she also noted how she had suggested revisions as he wrote.


title: Mary Shelley

text: Despite the emotions stirred by this task, Mary Shelley arguably proved herself in many respects a professional and scholarly editor. Working from Percy's messy, sometimes indecipherable, notebooks, she attempted to form a chronology for his writings, and she included poems, such as "Epipsychidion", addressed to Emilia Viviani, which she would rather have left out. She was forced, however, into several compromises, and, as Blumberg notes, "modern critics have found fault with the edition and claim variously that she miscopied, misinterpreted, purposely obscured, and attempted to turn the poet into something he was not". According to Wolfson, Donald Reiman, a modern editor of Percy Bysshe Shelley's works, still refers to Mary Shelley's editions, while acknowledging that her editing style belongs "to an age of editing when the aim was not to establish accurate texts and scholarly apparatus but to present a full record of a writer's career for the general reader". In principle, Mary Shelley believed in publishing every last word of her husband's work; but she found herself obliged to omit certain passages, either by pressure from her publisher, Edward Moxon, or in deference to public propriety. For example, she removed the atheistic passages from "Queen Mab" for the first edition. After she restored them in the second edition, Moxon was prosecuted and convicted of blasphemous libel, though the prosecution was brought out of principle by the Chartist publisher Henry Hetherington, and no punishment was sought. Mary Shelley's omissions provoked criticism, often stinging, from members of Percy Shelley's former circle, and reviewers accused her of, among other things, indiscriminate inclusions. Her notes have nevertheless remained an essential source for the study of Percy Shelley's work. As Bennett explains, "biographers and critics agree that Mary Shelley's commitment to bring Shelley the notice she believed his works merited was the single, major force that established Shelley's reputation during a period when he almost certainly would have faded from public view".


title: Mary Shelley

text: In her own lifetime, Mary Shelley was taken seriously as a writer, though reviewers often missed her writings' political edge. After her death, however, she was chiefly remembered as the wife of Percy Bysshe Shelley and as the author of "Frankenstein". In fact, in the introduction to her letters published in 1945, editor Frederick Jones wrote, "a collection of the present size could not be justified by the general quality of the letters or by Mary Shelley's importance as a writer. It is as the wife of [Percy Bysshe Shelley] that she excites our interest." This attitude had not disappeared by 1980 when Betty T. Bennett published the first volume of Mary Shelley's complete letters. As she explains, "the fact is that until recent years scholars have generally regarded Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley as a result: William Godwin's and Mary Wollstonecraft's daughter who became Shelley's Pygmalion." It was not until Emily Sunstein's "Mary Shelley: Romance and Reality" in 1989 that a full-length scholarly biography was published.


title: Mary Shelley

text: The attempts of Mary Shelley's son and daughter-in-law to "Victorianise" her memory by censoring biographical documents contributed to a perception of Mary Shelley as a more conventional, less reformist figure than her works suggest. Her own timid omissions from Percy Shelley's works and her quiet avoidance of public controversy in her later years added to this impression. Commentary by Hogg, Trelawny, and other admirers of Percy Shelley also tended to downplay Mary Shelley's radicalism. Trelawny's "Records of Shelley, Byron, and the Author" (1878) praised Percy Shelley at the expense of Mary, questioning her intelligence and even her authorship of "Frankenstein". Lady Shelley, Percy Florence's wife, responded in part by presenting a severely edited collection of letters she had inherited, published privately as "Shelley and Mary" in 1882.


title: Mary Shelley

text: From "Frankenstein"'s first theatrical adaptation in 1823 to the cinematic adaptations of the 20th century, including the first cinematic version in 1910 and now-famous versions such as James Whale's 1931 "Frankenstein", Mel Brooks' satirical 1974 "Young Frankenstein", and Kenneth Branagh's 1994 "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein", many audiences first encounter the work of Mary Shelley through adaptation. Over the course of the 19th century, Mary Shelley came to be seen as a one-novel author at best, rather than as the professional writer she was; most of her works have remained out of print until the last thirty years, obstructing a larger view of her achievement. In recent decades, the republication of almost all her writing has stimulated a new recognition of its value. Her habit of intensive reading and study, revealed in her journals and letters and reflected in her works, is now better appreciated. Shelley's conception of herself as an author has also been recognised; after Percy's death, she wrote of her authorial ambitions: "I think that I can maintain myself, and there is something inspiriting in the idea." Scholars now consider Mary Shelley to be a major Romantic figure, significant for her literary achievement and her political voice as a woman and a liberal.


title: Mary Shelley

text: Collections of Mary Shelley's papers are housed in "Lord Abinger's Shelley Collection" on deposit at the Bodleian Library, the New York Public Library (particularly The Carl H. Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle), the Huntington Library, the British Library, and in the John Murray Collection.


title: Mary Shelley

text: All essays from "The Cambridge Companion to Mary Shelley" are marked with a "(CC)" and those from "The Other Mary Shelley" with an "(OMS)".


title: Bea Arthur

text: Beatrice Arthur (born Bernice Frankel; May 13, 1922 – April 25, 2009) was an American actress and comedian. Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York City, Arthur began her career on stage in 1947, attracting critical acclaim before achieving worldwide recognition for her work on television beginning in the 1970s as Maude Findlay in the popular sitcoms "All in the Family" (1971–1972) and "Maude" (1972–1978) and later in the 1980s and 1990s as Dorothy Zbornak on "The Golden Girls" (1985–1992).


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur won several accolades throughout her career, beginning with the 1966 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for playing Vera Charles in "Mame". She won Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series in 1977 for "Maude" and 1988 for "The Golden Girls". Arthur has received the third most nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series with nine; only Julia Louis-Dreyfus (11) and Mary Tyler Moore (10) have more. She was inducted into the academy's Television Hall of Fame in 2008.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Her film appearances include "Lovers and Other Strangers" (1970) and the film version of "Mame" (1974). In 2002, she starred in the one-woman show "Bea Arthur on Broadway: Just Between Friends". An obituary described Arthur as "the tall, deep-voiced actress whose razor-sharp delivery of comedy lines made her a TV star."


title: Bea Arthur

text: Bernice Frankel was born on May 13, 1922, in Brooklyn, New York City, to Rebecca ( Pressner, born in Austria) and Philip Frankel (born in Poland). Arthur was raised in a Jewish home with her older sister Gertrude and younger sister Marian (1926–2014).


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1933, the Frankel family relocated to Cambridge, Maryland, where her parents subsequently operated a women's clothing shop. At age 16, Bernice developed a serious condition, coagulopathy, in which her blood would not clot. Concerned for her health, her parents sent her to Linden Hall, an all-girls' boarding school in Lititz, Pennsylvania, for her final two years of high school. Afterwards, she studied for a year at Blackstone College for Girls in Blackstone, Virginia.


title: Bea Arthur

text: During World War II, Frankel enlisted as one of the first members of the United States Marine Corps Women's Reserve in 1943. After basic training, she served as a typist at Marine headquarters in Washington, D.C. In June 1943, the Marine Corps accepted her transfer request to the Motor Transport School at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Frankel then worked as a truck driver and dispatcher in Cherry Point, North Carolina, between 1944 and 1945. She was honorably discharged at the rank of staff sergeant in September 1945.


title: Bea Arthur

text: After serving in the Marines, Frankel studied for a year at the Franklin School of Science and Arts in Philadelphia, where she became a licensed medical technician. After interning at a local hospital for the summer, she decided against working as a lab technician, departing for New York City in 1947 to enroll in the School of Drama at The New School.


title: Bea Arthur

text: From 1947, Beatrice Arthur studied at the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York City with German director Erwin Piscator.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur began her acting career as a member of an off-Broadway theater group at the Cherry Lane Theatre in New York City in the late 1940s. Onstage, her roles included Lucy Brown in the 1954 Off-Broadway premiere of Marc Blitzstein's English-language adaptation of Kurt Weill's "The Threepenny Opera", Nadine Fesser in the 1957 premiere of Herman Wouk's "Nature's Way" at the Coronet Theatre, Yente the Matchmaker in the 1964 premiere of "Fiddler on the Roof" on Broadway.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1966, Arthur auditioned for the title role in the musical "Mame", which her husband Gene Saks was set to direct, but Angela Lansbury won the role instead. Arthur accepted the supporting role of Vera Charles, for which she won great acclaim, winning a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical the same year. She reprised the role in the 1974 film version opposite Lucille Ball. In 1981, she appeared in Woody Allen's "The Floating Light Bulb".


title: Bea Arthur

text: She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in 1994 portraying the Duchess of Krakenthorp in Gaetano Donizetti's "La fille du régiment". In 1995, she starred opposite Renée Taylor and Joseph Bologna in "Bermuda Avenue Triangle" in Los Angeles.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1971, Arthur was invited by Norman Lear to guest-star on his sitcom "All in the Family", as Maude Findlay, the cousin of Edith Bunker. An outspoken liberal feminist, Maude was considered the antithesis to the caricatured reactionary Archie Bunker, who described her as a "New Deal fanatic". Nearly 50, Arthur's tart turn on "All in the Family" impressed viewers as well as executives at CBS who, she would later recall, asked "'Who is that girl? Let's give her her own series.'"


title: Bea Arthur

text: That series, "Maude", previewed in her second "All in the Family" appearance. The show, debuting in 1972, found her living in the affluent community of Tuckahoe, Westchester County, New York, with her fourth husband Walter (Bill Macy) and divorced daughter Carol (Adrienne Barbeau). Arthur's performance in the role garnered her several Emmy and Golden Globe nominations, winning an Emmy in 1977 for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series. "Maude" earned a place for Arthur in the history of the women's liberation movement.


title: Bea Arthur

text: The series addressed serious sociopolitical topics of the era that were considered taboo for a sitcom, including the Vietnam War, the Nixon Administration, Maude's bid for a Congressional seat, divorce, menopause, drug use, alcoholism, nervous breakdown, mental illness, women's lib, gay rights, abortion, and spousal abuse. A prime example is "Maude's Dilemma", a two-part episode airing near Thanksgiving 1972 in which Maude's character grapples with a late-life pregnancy, ultimately deciding to have an abortion. Even though abortion had been legal in New York State since 1970, as well as in California since its state's 1969 on-demand ruling, it was illegal in many other regions of the country and, as such, sparked controversy. As a result, dozens of network affiliates refused to broadcast the episode, substituting either a repeat from earlier in the season or a Thanksgiving TV special in its place. However, by the time of the summer rerun season six months later, the flak was reduced, and the stations that refused to air the episode upon its first run reinstated it for broadcast. As a result, a reported 65 million viewers watched the two-episode arc either on first run that November or during the following summer. The episode first aired two months before the U.S. Supreme Court legalized the procedure nationwide in the "Roe v. Wade" outcome in January 1973.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1978, during the show's sixth season, Arthur decided to exit the series. Later that year she costarred in "Star Wars Holiday Special", in which she had a song and dance routine in the Mos Eisley cantina. She hosted "The Beatrice Arthur Special" on CBS on January 19, 1980, which paired the star in a musical comedy revue with Rock Hudson, Melba Moore and Wayland Flowers and Madame.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur returned to television in the short-lived 1983 sitcom "Amanda's" (an adaptation of the British series "Fawlty Towers"). The show proved unsuccessful, with only 10 episodes broadcast of 13 filmed.In 1985, at the age of 63, Arthur was cast in "The Golden Girls", in which she played Dorothy Zbornak, a divorced mother and substitute teacher living in a Miami, Florida, house owned by widow Blanche Devereaux (Rue McClanahan). Her other roommates included widow Rose Nylund (Betty White) and Dorothy's Sicilian mother, Sophia Petrillo (Estelle Getty). Getty was actually a year younger than Arthur in real life. Initially, Betty White was cast as the man-hungry Blanche, and Rue McClanahan (who had previously co-starred with Arthur in "Maude") was cast as the naive Rose. Arthur refused to be in a show essentially about Maude and Vivian living with Sue Ann Nivens. After White and McClanahan switched roles, Arthur reconsidered. The series was a hit and remained a top-ten rating fixture for six of its seven seasons. Arthur's performances led to several Emmy nominations over the course of the series and an Emmy win in 1988. Arthur left the show after seven years, and in 1992, it moved from NBC to CBS and retooled as "The Golden Palace" in which the other three actresses reprised their roles, with Cheech Marin as their new foil. Arthur made a guest appearance in a two-part episode, but the new series lasted just one season.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1984, Arthur, who had otherwise refused to appear in advertising, accepted a lucrative offer from Canadian drugstore chain Shoppers Drug Mart to be their commercial spokeswoman, on the condition that the commercials would never be seen in the United States. Arthur spent seven years in the position, continuing as spokeswoman during her run on "The Golden Girls" by commuting to Toronto for commercial tapings.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur sporadically appeared in films, reprising her stage role as Vera Charles in the 1974 film adaption of "Mame", opposite Lucille Ball. She portrayed overbearing mother Bea Vecchio in "Lovers and Other Strangers" (1970), and had a cameo as a Roman unemployment clerk in Mel Brooks' "History of the World, Part I" (1981). She appeared in the 1995 American movie "For Better or Worse" as Beverly Makeshift.


title: Bea Arthur

text: After Arthur left "The Golden Girls", she made guest appearances on television shows and organized and toured in her one-woman show, alternately titled "An Evening with Bea Arthur" as well as "And Then There's Bea". She made a guest appearance on the American cartoon "Futurama", in the Emmy-nominated 2001 episode "Amazon Women in the Mood", as the voice of the feminist "Femputer" who ruled a race of giant Amazonian women. She appeared in a first-season episode of "Malcolm in the Middle" as Mrs. White, one of Dewey's babysitters who was a strict disciplinarian. She was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance. She appeared as Larry David's mother on "Curb Your Enthusiasm".


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 2002, she returned to Broadway, starring in "Bea Arthur on Broadway: Just Between Friends", a collection of stories and songs (with musician Billy Goldenberg) based on her life and career. The show was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In addition to appearing in programs looking back at her own work, Arthur performed in stage and television tributes for Jerry Herman, Bob Hope, Ellen DeGeneres. In 2004, she appeared in Richard Barone's "There'll Be Another Spring: A Tribute to Miss Peggy Lee" at the Hollywood Bowl, performing "Johnny Guitar" and "The Shining Sea". In 2005, she participated in the Comedy Central roast of Pamela Anderson, where she recited sexually explicit passages from Anderson's book "Star Struck" in a deadpan fashion.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1999, Arthur told an interviewer of the three influences in her career: "Sid Caesar taught me the outrageous; [method acting guru] Lee Strasberg taught me what I call reality; and [original "Threepenny Opera" star] Lotte Lenya, whom I adored, taught me economy." Another source of influence to Arthur was that of famed actress/director Ida Lupino, whom Arthur praised: "My dream was to become a very small blonde movie star like Ida Lupino and those other women I saw up there on the screen during the Depression. "


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur was married twice. Her first marriage took place in 1944, during her time in the military when she wed fellow Marine Robert Alan Aurthur, later a screenwriter, television, and film producer and director. They divorced three years later, but she kept his surname, with the spelling adjusted to "Arthur". Shortly after they divorced in 1950, she married director Gene Saks with whom she adopted two sons, Matthew, an actor, and Daniel, a set designer. She and Saks remained married until 1978.


title: Bea Arthur

text: In 1972, she moved to Los Angeles and sublet her apartment on Central Park West in New York City and her country home in Bedford, New York. In a 2003 interview, while in London promoting her one-woman show, she described the English capital as her "favorite city in the world".


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur was a longtime champion of equal rights for women and an active advocate of the elderly and Jewish communities in both her major television roles and through her charity work and personal outspokenness. Contrary to the character she played as Maude, she was originally skeptical of the women's rights movement. Following her divorce from Gene Saks, she later adopted the language of that movement.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Considered a longtime gay icon, she embraced the gay community that had supported her since the 1970s. Late in life, Arthur took up the cause of LGBTQ+ youth homelessness. She raised $40,000 for the Ali Forney Center with one of her final live performances, a revival of her one-woman Broadway show in 2005 after she had fallen ill with cancer. She would go on to advocate for the center until her death, telling


title: Bea Arthur

text: "Next Magazine", "These kids at the Ali Forney Center are literally dumped by their families because they are lesbian, gay or transgender — this organization really is saving lives."


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur was a private and introverted woman according to her friends. She was a particularly close mentor and friend to Adrienne Barbeau, who co-starred with her on "Maude" for six seasons. Barbeau was unavailable to perform regularly on the sitcom during its last season due to her schedule; nevertheless, the two remained close and stayed in touch for the rest of Arthur's life. In a 2018 interview with the American website Dread Central, Barbeau shared some of her feelings about her friend:


title: Bea Arthur

text: On April 28, 2009, the Broadway community paid tribute to Arthur by dimming the marquees of New York City's Broadway theater district in her memory for one minute at 8:00 p.m. On September 16, 2009, a public tribute to Arthur was held at the Majestic Theatre in Manhattan, where friends and colleagues including Angela Lansbury, Norman Lear, Rosie O'Donnell and Rue McClanahan paid tribute to the actress.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur's surviving co-stars from "The Golden Girls", McClanahan and White, commented on her death via telephone on an April 27 episode of "Larry King Live". On the "Today Show" by phone, McClanahan said she and Arthur got along together "like cream." White said "I knew it would hurt, I just didn't know it would hurt this much."


title: Bea Arthur

text: Longtime friends Adrienne Barbeau (with whom she had worked on "Maude") and Angela Lansbury (with whom she had worked in "Mame") reflected on her death. Barbeau said, "We've lost a unique, incredible talent. No one could deliver a line or hold a take like Bea and no one was more generous or giving to her fellow performers." Lansbury said, "She became and has remained my bosom buddy [...] I am deeply saddened by her passing, but also relieved that she is released from the pain."


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur bequeathed $300,000 to the Ali Forney Center, a New York City organization that provides housing for homeless LGBTQ+ youths. The center was heavily damaged in October 2012 by Hurricane Sandy, but has since been restored and re-opened. The Bea Arthur Residence, which opened in 2017, is an 18-bed residence in Manhattan for homeless LGBT youth operated by the Ali Forney Center.


title: Bea Arthur

text: An Emmy and Tony Award winner, Arthur was an Academy Award away from achieving the Triple Crown of Acting status.


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur won the American Theatre Wing's Tony Award in 1966 as Best Featured Actress in a Musical for her performance that year as Vera Charles in the original Broadway production of Jerry Herman's musical "Mame".


title: Bea Arthur

text: Arthur received the third most nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series with nine; only Julia Louis-Dreyfus (11) and Mary Tyler Moore (10) have more. She received the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series twice, once in 1977 for "Maude" and again in 1988 for "The Golden Girls". She was inducted into the academy's Television Hall of Fame in 2008.


title: Bea Arthur

text: On June 8, 2008, "The Golden Girls" was awarded the Pop Culture award at the Sixth Annual TV Land Awards. Arthur (in one of her final public appearances) accepted the award with McClanahan and White.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus), sometimes referred to as the duck-billed platypus, is a semiaquatic, egg-laying mammal endemic to eastern Australia, including Tasmania. The platypus is the sole living representative or monotypic taxon of its family (Ornithorhynchidae) and genus (Ornithorhynchus), though a number of related species appear in the fossil record.


title: Platypus

text: Together with the four species of echidna, it is one of the five extant species of monotremes, mammals that lay eggs instead of giving birth to live young. Like other monotremes, it senses prey through electrolocation. It is one of the few species of venomous mammals, as the male platypus has a spur on the hind foot that delivers a venom, capable of causing severe pain to humans. The unusual appearance of this egg-laying, duck-billed, beaver-tailed, otter-footed mammal baffled European naturalists when they first encountered it, and the first scientists to examine a preserved platypus body (in 1799) judged it a fake, made of several animals sewn together.


title: Platypus

text: The unique features of the platypus make it an important subject in the study of evolutionary biology, and a recognisable and iconic symbol of Australia. It is culturally significant to several Aboriginal peoples of Australia, who also used to hunt the animal for food. It has appeared as a mascot at national events and features on the reverse of the Australian twenty-cent coin, and the platypus is the animal emblem of the state of New South Wales. Until the early 20th century, humans hunted the platypus for its fur, but it is now protected throughout its range. Although captive-breeding programs have had only limited success, and the platypus is vulnerable to the effects of pollution, it is not under any immediate threat.


title: Platypus

text: , the platypus is a legally protected species in all states where it occurs. It is listed as an endangered species in South Australia and vulnerable in Victoria. The species is classified as a near-threatened species by the IUCN, but a November 2020 report has recommended that it is upgraded to threatened species under the federal "EPBC Act", due to habitat destruction and declining numbers in all states.


title: Platypus

text: When the platypus was first encountered by Europeans in 1798, a pelt and sketch were sent back to Great Britain by Captain John Hunter, the second Governor of New South Wales. British scientists' initial hunch was that the attributes were a hoax. George Shaw, who produced the first description of the animal in the "Naturalist's Miscellany" in 1799, stated it was impossible not to entertain doubts as to its genuine nature, and Robert Knox believed it might have been produced by some Asian taxidermist. It was thought that somebody had sewn a duck's beak onto the body of a beaver-like animal. Shaw even took a pair of scissors to the dried skin to check for stitches.


title: Platypus

text: The common name "platypus" literally means 'flat-foot', deriving from the Greek word (), from ( 'broad, wide, flat') and ( 'foot'). Shaw initially assigned the species the Linnaean name "Platypus anatinus" when he described it, but the genus term was quickly discovered to already be in use as the name of the wood-boring ambrosia beetle genus "Platypus". It was independently described as "Ornithorhynchus paradoxus" by Johann Blumenbach in 1800 (from a specimen given to him by Sir Joseph Banks) and following the rules of priority of nomenclature, it was later officially recognised as "Ornithorhynchus anatinus".


title: Platypus

text: There is no universally-agreed plural form of "platypus" in the English language. Scientists generally use "platypuses" or simply "platypus". Colloquially, the term "platypi" is also used for the plural, although this is a form of pseudo-Latin; going by the word's Greek roots the plural would be "platypodes". Early British settlers called it by many names, such as "watermole", "duckbill", and "duckmole". Occasionally it is specifically called the "duck-billed platypus".


title: Platypus

text: The scientific name "Ornithorhynchus anatinus" literally means 'duck-like bird-snout', deriving its genus name from the Greek root ( "ornith" or "órnīs" 'bird') and the word ( 'snout', 'beak'). Its species name is derived from Latin ('duck-like') from 'duck'. The platypus is the sole living representative or monotypic taxon of its family (Ornithorhynchidae).


title: Platypus

text: In David Collins's account of the new colony 1788–1801, he describes coming across "an amphibious animal, of the mole species". His account includes a drawing of the animal.


title: Platypus

text: The body and the broad, flat tail of the platypus are covered with dense, brown, biofluorescent fur that traps a layer of insulating air to keep the animal warm. The fur is waterproof, and the texture is akin to that of a mole. The platypus uses its tail for storage of fat reserves (an adaptation also found in animals such as the Tasmanian devil). The webbing on the feet is more significant on the front feet and is folded back when walking on land. The elongated snout and lower jaw are covered in soft skin, forming the bill. The nostrils are located on the dorsal surface of the snout, while the eyes and ears are located in a groove set just back from it; this groove is closed when swimming. Platypuses have been heard to emit a low growl when disturbed and a range of other vocalisations have been reported in captive specimens.


title: Platypus

text: Weight varies considerably from , with males being larger than females. Males average in total length, while females average , with substantial variation in average size from one region to another. This pattern does not seem to follow any particular climatic rule and may be due to other environmental factors, such as predation and human encroachment.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus has an average body temperature of about rather than the typical of placental mammals. Research suggests this has been a gradual adaptation to harsh environmental conditions on the part of the small number of surviving monotreme species rather than a historical characteristic of monotremes.


title: Platypus

text: Modern platypus young have three teeth in each of the maxillae (one premolar and two molars) and dentaries (three molars), which they lose before or just after leaving the breeding burrow; adults have heavily keratinised pads called ceratodontes in their place, which they use to grind food. The first upper and third lower cheek teeth of platypus nestlings are small, each having one principal cusp, while the other teeth have two main cusps. The platypus jaw is constructed differently from that of other mammals, and the jaw-opening muscle is different. As in all true mammals, the tiny bones that conduct sound in the middle ear are fully incorporated into the skull, rather than lying in the jaw as in pre mammalian synapsids. However, the external opening of the ear still lies at the base of the jaw. The platypus has extra bones in the shoulder girdle, including an interclavicle, which is not found in other mammals. As in many other aquatic and semiaquatic vertebrates, the bones show osteosclerosis, increasing their density to provide ballast. It has a reptilian gait, with the legs on the sides of the body, rather than underneath. When on land, it engages in knuckle-walking on its front feet, to protect the webbing between the toes.


title: Platypus

text: While both male and female platypuses are born with ankle spurs, only the spurs on the male's back ankles deliver venom,


title: Platypus

text: composed largely of defensin-like proteins (DLPs), three of which are unique to the platypus. The DLPs are produced by the immune system of the platypus. The function of defensins is to cause lysis in pathogenic bacteria and viruses, but in platypuses they also are formed into venom for defence. Although powerful enough to kill smaller animals such as dogs, the venom is not lethal to humans, but the pain is so excruciating that the victim may be incapacitated. Oedema rapidly develops around the wound and gradually spreads throughout the affected limb. Information obtained from case histories and anecdotal evidence indicates the pain develops into a long-lasting hyperalgesia (a heightened sensitivity to pain) that persists for days or even months. Venom is produced in the crural glands of the male, which are kidney-shaped alveolar glands connected by a thin-walled duct to a calcaneus spur on each hind limb. The female platypus, in common with echidnas, has rudimentary spur buds that do not develop (dropping off before the end of their first year) and lack functional crural glands.


title: Platypus

text: The venom appears to have a different function from those produced by non-mammalian species; its effects are not life-threatening to humans, but nevertheless powerful enough to seriously impair the victim. Since only males produce venom and production rises during the breeding season, it may be used as an offensive weapon to assert dominance during this period.


title: Platypus

text: Similar spurs are found on many archaic mammal groups, indicating that this is an ancient characteristic for mammals as a whole, and not exclusive to the platypus or other monotremes.


title: Platypus

text: Monotremes are the only mammals (apart from at least one species of dolphin-- the Guiana Dolphin) known to have a sense of electroreception: they locate their prey in part by detecting electric fields generated by muscular contractions. The platypus's electroreception is the most sensitive of any monotreme.


title: Platypus

text: The electroreceptors are located in rostrocaudal rows in the skin of the bill, while mechanoreceptors (which detect touch) are uniformly distributed across the bill. The electrosensory area of the cerebral cortex is contained within the tactile somatosensory area, and some cortical cells receive input from both electroreceptors and mechanoreceptors, suggesting a close association between the tactile and electric senses. Both electroreceptors and mechanoreceptors in the bill dominate the somatotopic map of the platypus brain, in the same way human hands dominate the Penfield homunculus map.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus can determine the direction of an electric source, perhaps by comparing differences in signal strength across the sheet of electroreceptors. This would explain the characteristic side-to-side motion of the animal's head while hunting. The cortical convergence of electrosensory and tactile inputs suggests a mechanism that determines the distance of prey that, when they move, emit both electrical signals and mechanical pressure pulses. The platypus uses the difference between arrival times of the two signals to sense distance.


title: Platypus

text: Feeding by neither sight nor smell, the platypus closes its eyes, ears, and nose each time it dives. Rather, when it digs in the bottom of streams with its bill, its electroreceptors detect tiny electric currents generated by muscular contractions of its prey, so enabling it to distinguish between animate and inanimate objects, which continuously stimulate its mechanoreceptors. Experiments have shown the platypus will even react to an "artificial shrimp" if a small electric current is passed through it.


title: Platypus

text: Monotreme electrolocation probably evolved in order to allow the animals to forage in murky waters, and may be tied to their tooth loss. The extinct "Obdurodon" was electroreceptive, but unlike the modern platypus it foraged pelagically (near the ocean surface).


title: Platypus

text: In recent studies it has been suggested that the eyes of the platypus are more similar to those of Pacific hagfish or Northern Hemisphere lampreys than to those of most tetrapods. The eyes also contain double cones, which most mammals do not have.


title: Platypus

text: Although the platypus's eyes are small and not used under water, several features indicate that vision played an important role in its ancestors. The corneal surface and the adjacent surface of the lens is flat while the posterior surface of the lens is steeply curved, similar to the eyes of other aquatic mammals such as otters and sea-lions. A temporal (ear side) concentration of retinal ganglion cells, important for binocular vision, indicates a role in predation, while the accompanying visual acuity is insufficient for such activities. Furthermore, this limited acuity is matched by a low cortical magnification, a small lateral geniculate nucleus and a large optic tectum, suggesting that the visual midbrain plays a more important role than the visual cortex, as in some rodents. These features suggest that the platypus has adapted to an aquatic and nocturnal lifestyle, developing its electrosensory system at the cost of its visual system; an evolutionary process paralleled by the small number of electroreceptors in the short-beaked echidna, which dwells in dry environments, whilst the long-beaked echidna, which lives in moist environments, is intermediate between the other two monotremes.


title: Platypus

text: In 2020, research in biofluorescence revealed that the platypus glows a bluish-green color when exposed to black light.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is semiaquatic, inhabiting small streams and rivers over an extensive range from the cold highlands of Tasmania and the Australian Alps to the tropical rainforests of coastal Queensland as far north as the base of the Cape York Peninsula.


title: Platypus

text: Inland, its distribution is not well known. It was considered extinct on the South Australian mainland, with the last sighting recorded at Renmark in 1975, until some years after John Wamsley had created Warrawong Sanctuary (see below) in the 1980s, setting a platypus breeding program there, and it had subsequently closed. In 2017 there were some unconfirmed sightings downstream, outside the sanctuary, and in October 2020 a nesting platypus was filmed inside the recently reopened sanctuary. There is a population on Kangaroo Island introduced in the 1920s, which was said to stand at 150 individuals in the Rocky River region of Flinders Chase National Park before the 2019–20 Australian bushfire season, in which large portions of the island burnt, decimating all wildlife. However, with the SA Department for Environment and Water recovery teams working hard to reinstate their habitat, there had been a number of sightings reported by April 2020.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is no longer found in the main part of the Murray-Darling Basin, possibly due to the declining water quality brought about by extensive land clearing and irrigation schemes. Along the coastal river systems, its distribution is unpredictable; it appears to be absent from some relatively healthy rivers, and yet maintains a presence in others, for example, the lower Maribyrnong, that are quite degraded.


title: Platypus

text: In captivity, platypuses have survived to 17 years of age, and wild specimens have been recaptured when 11 years old. Mortality rates for adults in the wild appear to be low. Natural predators include snakes, water rats, goannas, hawks, owls, and eagles. Low platypus numbers in northern Australia are possibly due to predation by crocodiles. The introduction of red foxes in 1845 for hunting may have had some impact on its numbers on the mainland. The platypus is generally regarded as nocturnal and crepuscular, but individuals are also active during the day, particularly when the sky is overcast. Its habitat bridges rivers and the riparian zone for both a food supply of prey species, and banks where it can dig resting and nesting burrows. It may have a range of up to , with a male's home range overlapping those of three or four females.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is an excellent swimmer and spends much of its time in the water foraging for food. It has a very characteristic swimming style and no external ears. Uniquely among mammals, it propels itself when swimming by an alternate rowing motion of the front feet; although all four feet of the platypus are webbed, the hind feet (which are held against the body) do not assist in propulsion, but are used for steering in combination with the tail. The species is endothermic, maintaining its body temperature at about 32°C (90°F), lower than most mammals, even while foraging for hours in water below 5°C (41°F).


title: Platypus

text: Dives normally last around 30 seconds, but can last longer, although few exceed the estimated aerobic limit of 40 seconds. Recovery at the surface between dives commonly takes from 10 to 20 seconds.


title: Platypus

text: When not in the water, the platypus retires to a short, straight resting burrow of oval cross-section, nearly always in the riverbank not far above water level, and often hidden under a protective tangle of roots.


title: Platypus

text: The average sleep time of a platypus is said to be as long as 14 hours per day, possibly because it eats crustaceans, which provide a high level of calories.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is a carnivore: it feeds on annelid worms, insect larvae, freshwater shrimp, and freshwater yabby (crayfish) that it digs out of the riverbed with its snout or catches while swimming. It uses cheek-pouches to carry prey to the surface, where it is eaten. The platypus needs to eat about 20% of its own weight each day, which requires it to spend an average of 12 hours daily looking for food.


title: Platypus

text: When the platypus was first encountered by European naturalists, they were divided over whether the female lays eggs. This was finally confirmed by William Hay Caldwell's team in 1884.


title: Platypus

text: The species exhibits a single breeding season; mating occurs between June and October, with some local variation taking place between different populations across its range. Historical observation, mark-and-recapture studies, and preliminary investigations of population genetics indicate the possibility of both resident and transient members of populations, and suggest a polygynous mating system. Females are thought likely to become sexually mature in their second year, with breeding confirmed still to take place in animals over nine years old.


title: Platypus

text: Outside the mating season, the platypus lives in a simple ground burrow, the entrance of which is about above the water level. After mating, the female constructs a deeper, more elaborate burrow up to long and blocked at intervals with plugs (which may act as a safeguard against rising waters or predators, or as a method of regulating humidity and temperature). The male takes no part in caring for his young, and retreats to his year-long burrow. The female softens the ground in the burrow with dead, folded, wet leaves, and she fills the nest at the end of the tunnel with fallen leaves and reeds for bedding material. This material is dragged to the nest by tucking it underneath her curled tail.


title: Platypus

text: The female platypus has a pair of ovaries, but only the left one is functional. The platypus's genes are a possible evolutionary link between the mammalian XY and bird/reptile ZW sex-determination systems because one of the platypus's five X chromosomes contains the DMRT1 gene, which birds possess on their Z chromosome. It lays one to three (usually two) small, leathery eggs (similar to those of reptiles), about in diameter and slightly rounder than bird eggs. The eggs develop "in utero" for about 28 days, with only about 10 days of external incubation (in contrast to a chicken egg, which spends about one day in tract and 21 days externally). After laying her eggs, the female curls around them. The incubation period is divided into three phases. In the first phase, the embryo has no functional organs and relies on the yolk sac for sustenance. The yolk is absorbed by the developing young. During the second phase, the digits develop, and in the last phase, the egg tooth appears.


title: Platypus

text: Most mammal zygotes go through holoblastic cleavage, meaning that, following fertilization, the ovum is split due to cell divisions into multiple, divisible daughter cells. This is in comparison to the more ancestral process of meroblastic cleavage, present in monotremes like the platypus and in non-mammals like reptiles and birds. In meroblastic cleavage, the ovum does not split completely. This causes the cells at the edge of the yolk to be cytoplasmically continuous with the egg's cytoplasm. This allows the yolk, which contains the embryo, to exchange waste and nutrients with the cytoplasm.


title: Platypus

text: There is no official term for platypus young, but the term "platypup" sees unofficial use, as does "puggle". Newly hatched platypuses are vulnerable, blind, and hairless, and are fed by the mother's milk. Although possessing mammary glands, the platypus lacks teats. Instead, milk is released through pores in the skin. The milk pools in grooves on her abdomen, allowing the young to lap it up. After they hatch, the offspring are suckled for three to four months. During incubation and weaning, the mother initially leaves the burrow only for short periods, to forage. When doing so, she creates a number of thin soil plugs along the length of the burrow, possibly to protect the young from predators; pushing past these on her return forces water from her fur and allows the burrow to remain dry. After about five weeks, the mother begins to spend more time away from her young, and at around four months, the young emerge from the burrow. A platypus is born with teeth, but these drop out at a very early age, leaving the horny plates it uses to grind food.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus and other monotremes were very poorly understood, and some of the 19th century myths that grew up around themfor example, that the monotremes were "inferior" or quasireptilianstill endure. In 1947, William King Gregory theorised that placental mammals and marsupials may have diverged earlier, and a subsequent branching divided the monotremes and marsupials, but later research and fossil discoveries have suggested this is incorrect. In fact, modern monotremes are the survivors of an early branching of the mammal tree, and a later branching is thought to have led to the marsupial and placental groups. Molecular clock and fossil dating suggest platypuses split from echidnas around 19–48million years ago.


title: Platypus

text: The oldest discovered fossil of the modern platypus dates back to about 100,000 years ago, during the Quaternary period. The extinct monotremes "Teinolophos" and "Steropodon" were once thought to be closely related to the modern platypus, but are now considered more basal taxa. The fossilised "Steropodon" was discovered in New South Wales and is composed of an opalised lower jawbone with three molar teeth (whereas the adult contemporary platypus is toothless). The molar teeth were initially thought to be tribosphenic, which would have supported a variation of Gregory's theory, but later research has suggested, while they have three cusps, they evolved under a separate process. The fossil is thought to be about 110million years old, making it the oldest mammal fossil found in Australia. Unlike the modern platypus (and echidnas), "Teinolophos" lacked a beak.


title: Platypus

text: "Monotrematum sudamericanum", another fossil relative of the platypus, has been found in Argentina, indicating monotremes were present in the supercontinent of Gondwana when the continents of South America and Australia were joined via Antarctica (until about 167million years ago). A fossilised tooth of a giant platypus species, "Obdurodon tharalkooschild", was dated 5–15million years ago. Judging by the tooth, the animal measured 1.3 metres long, making it the largest platypus on record.


title: Platypus

text: Because of the early divergence from the therian mammals and the low numbers of extant monotreme species, the platypus is a frequent subject of research in evolutionary biology. In 2004, researchers at the Australian National University discovered the platypus has ten sex chromosomes, compared with two (XY) in most other mammals. These ten chromosomes form five unique pairs of XY in males and XX in females, i.e. males are XYXYXYXYXY. One of the X chromosomes of the platypus has great homology to the bird Z chromosome. The platypus genome also has both reptilian and mammalian genes associated with egg fertilisation. Though the platypus lacks the mammalian sex-determining gene SRY, a study found that the mechanism of sex determination is the AMH gene on the oldest Y chromosome. A draft version of the platypus genome sequence was published in "Nature" on 8May 2008, revealing both reptilian and mammalian elements, as well as two genes found previously only in birds, amphibians, and fish. More than 80% of the platypus's genes are common to the other mammals whose genomes have been sequenced. An updated genome, the most complete on record, was published in 2021, together with the genome of the short-beaked echidna.


title: Platypus

text: Except for its loss from the state of South Australia, the platypus occupies the same general distribution as it did prior to European settlement of Australia. However, local changes and fragmentation of distribution due to human modification of its habitat are documented. Its historical abundance is unknown and its current abundance difficult to gauge, but it is assumed to have declined in numbers, although as of 1998 was still being considered as common over most of its current range. The species was extensively hunted for its fur until the early years of the 20th century and, although protected throughout Australia since 1905, until about 1950 it was still at risk of drowning in the nets of inland fisheries.


title: Platypus

text: The International Union for Conservation of Nature recategorised its status as "near threatened" in 2016. The species is protected by law, but the only state in which it is listed as endangered is South Australia, under the "National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972". In 2020 it has been recommended to be listed as a vulnerable species in Victoria under the state's "Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act 1988".


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is not considered to be in immediate danger of extinction, because conservation measures have been successful, but it could be adversely affected by habitat disruption caused by dams, irrigation, pollution, netting, and trapping. Reduction of watercourse flows and water levels through excessive droughts and extraction of water for industrial, agricultural, and domestic supplies are also considered a threat. The IUCN lists the platypus on its Red List as "Near Threatened" as assessed in 2016, when it was estimated that numbers had reduced by about 30 percent on average since European settlement. The animal is listed as endangered in South Australia, but it is not covered at all under the federal "EPBC Act".


title: Platypus

text: Researchers have worried for years that declines have been greater than assumed. In January 2020, researchers from the University of New South Wales presented evidence that the platypus is at risk of extinction, due to a combination of extraction of water resources, land clearing, climate change and severe drought. The study predicted that, considering current threats, the animals' abundance would decline by 47%–66% and metapopulation occupancy by 22%–32% over 50 years, causing "extinction of local populations across about 40% of the range". Under projections of climate change projections to 2070, reduced habitat due to drought would lead to 51–73% reduced abundance and 36–56% reduced metapopulation occupancy within 50 years respectively. These predictions suggested that the species would fall under the "Vulnerable" classification. The authors stressed the need for national conservation efforts, which might include conducting more surveys, tracking trends, reduction of threats and improvement of river management to ensure healthy platypus habitat. Co-author Gilad Bino is concerned that the estimates of the 2016 baseline numbers could be wrong, and numbers may have been reduced by as much as half already.


title: Platypus

text: A November 2020 report by scientists from the University of New South Wales, funded by a research grant from the Australian Conservation Foundation in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund Australia and the Humane Society International Australia revealed that that platypus habitat in Australia had shrunk by 22 per cent in the previous 30 years, and recommended that the platypus should be listed as a threatened species under the "EPBC Act". Declines in population had been greatest in NSW, in particular in the Murray-Darling Basin.


title: Platypus

text: Platypuses generally suffer from few diseases in the wild; however, as of 2008 there was concern in Tasmania about the potential impacts of a disease caused by the fungus "Mucor amphibiorum". The disease (termed mucormycosis) affects only Tasmanian platypuses, and had not been observed in platypuses in mainland Australia. Affected platypuses can develop skin lesions or ulcers on various parts of their bodies, including their backs, tails, and legs. Mucormycosis can kill platypuses, death arising from secondary infection and by affecting the animals' ability to maintain body temperature and forage efficiently. The Biodiversity Conservation Branch at the Department of Primary Industries and Water collaborated with NRM north and University of Tasmania researchers to determine the impacts of the disease on Tasmanian platypuses, as well as the mechanism of transmission and spread of the disease.


title: Platypus

text: Much of the world was introduced to the platypus in 1939 when "National Geographic Magazine" published an article on the platypus and the efforts to study and raise it in captivity. The latter is a difficult task, and only a few young have been successfully raised since, notably at Healesville Sanctuary in Victoria. The leading figure in these efforts was David Fleay, who established a platypusary (a simulated stream in a tank) at the Healesville Sanctuary, where breeding was successful in 1943. In 1972, he found a dead baby of about 50 days old, which had presumably been born in captivity, at his wildlife park at Burleigh Heads on the Gold Coast, Queensland. Healesville repeated its success in 1998 and again in 2000 with a similar stream tank. Since 2008, platypus has bred regularly at Healesville, including second-generation (captive born themselves breeding in captivity). Taronga Zoo in Sydney bred twins in 2003, and breeding was again successful there in 2006.


title: Platypus

text: As of 2019, the only platypuses in captivity outside of Australia are in the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in the U.S. state of California. Three attempts were made to bring the animals to the Bronx Zoo, in 1922, 1947, and 1958; of these, only two of the three animals introduced in 1947 lived longer than eighteen months.


title: Platypus

text: Aboriginal Australians used to hunt platypuses for food (their fatty tails being particularly nutritious), while, after colonisation, Europeans hunted them for fur from the late 19th century and until 1912, when it was prohibited by law. In addition, European researchers captured and killed platypus or removed their eggs, partly in order to increase scientific knowledge, but also to gain prestige and outcompete rivals from different countries.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus has been a subject in the Dreamtime stories of Aboriginal Australians, some of whom believed the animal was a hybrid of a duck and a water rat.


title: Platypus

text: According to one story of the upper Darling River, the major animal groups, the land animals, water animals and birds, all competed for the platypus to join their respective groups, but the platypus ultimately decided to not join any of them, feeling that he did not need to be part of a group to be special, and wished to remain friends with all of those groups. Another Dreaming story emanate of the upper Darling tells of a young duck which ventured too far, ignoring the warnings of her tribe, and was kidnapped by a large water-rat called Biggoon. After managing to escape after some time, she returned and laid two eggs which hatched into strange furry creatures, so they were all banished and went to live in the mountains.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus is also used by some Aboriginal peoples as a totem, which is to them "a natural object, plant or animal that is inherited by members of a clan or family as their spiritual emblem", and the animal holds special meaning as a totem animal for the Wadi Wadi people, who live along the Murray River. Because of their cultural significance and importance in connection to country, the platypus is protected and conserved by these Indigenous peoples.


title: Platypus

text: The platypus has often been used as a symbol of Australia's cultural identity. In the 1940s, live platypuses were given to allies in the Second World War, in order to strengthen ties and boost morale.


title: Platypus

text: Platypuses have been used several times as mascots: Syd the platypus was one of the three mascots chosen for the Sydney 2000 Olympics along with an echidna and a kookaburra, Expo Oz the platypus was the mascot for World Expo 88, which was held in Brisbane in 1988, and Hexley the platypus is the mascot for the Darwin operating system, the BSD-based core of macOS and other operating systems from Apple Inc.


title: Platypus

text: Since the introduction of decimal currency to Australia in 1966, the embossed image of a platypus, designed and sculpted by Stuart Devlin, has appeared on the reverse (tails) side of the 20-cent coin. The platypus has frequently appeared in Australian postage stamps, most recently the 2015 "Native Animals" series and the 2016 "Australian Animals Monotremes" series.


title: Platypus

text: In the American animated series "Phineas and Ferb" (2007–2015), the title characters own a pet bluish-green platypus named Perry who, unknown to them, is a secret agent. Such choices were inspired by media underuse, as well as to exploit the animal's striking appearance; additionally, show creator Dan Povenmire, who also wrote the character's theme song, said that its opening lyrics are based on the introductory sentence of the Platypus article on Wikipedia, copying the "semiaquatic egg-laying mammal" phrase word for word, and appending the phrase "of action". As a character, Perry has been well received by both fans and critics. Coincidentally, real platypuses show a similar cyan color when seen under ultraviolet lighting.


title: Bestgore.com

text: bestgore.com (stylized as BestGore.com and abbreviated BG) was a Canadian shock site owned by Mark Marek, which provided highly violent real-life news, photos and videos, with authored opinion and user comments. The site received media attention in 2012, following the hosting of a snuff film depicting the murder of Jun Lin. As a result, Marek was arrested and charged under Canada's obscenity law with corrupting public morals.


title: Bestgore.com

text: The site was launched on April 30, 2008, by Slovak-Canadian Mark Marek, and hosted explicit, real-life, photographic and video material of events such as murders, suicides, torture, open surgeries, mutilations and accidents.


title: Bestgore.com

text: In a 2017 interview with GQ Australia, Mark Marek insisted that running BestGore.com costs more than it generates in revenue and said, "No company with a reasonable budget would want to advertise on a website that exposes police brutality, government abuse of citizens, war profiteering and similar anti-people activities. So all I'm left with is porn. Worse yet, porn earns less today than it did five years ago".


title: Bestgore.com

text: As of November 15, 2020, the website is considered defunct as Marek, its founder and administrator, has decided to focus his attention on other interests. On November 17, 2020, when asked in the comment section on BestGore.com's lbry.tv site whether BestGore.com is down and if it will be indefinitely, Mark Marek replied, "Most likely permanently".


title: Bestgore.com

text: In June 2012, the website was criticized for the inclusion of the graphic video titled "1 Lunatic 1 Ice Pick", which depicts the rape and dismemberment of a corpse following the murder of Jun Lin committed by Luka Magnotta. Police said that Marek had initially refused requests to remove the video from the site, while Marek said, "I took it down myself, on my own terms, without being asked. Had any such request by police to take it down, as alleged, been made, I would have just told them that the video had been down for days." Gil Zvulony, a Toronto-based lawyer specializing in Internet law, stated that the evidence supported the laying of obscenity charges against BestGore.com, stating, "There's no real crime where there's no knowledge, but once they got notice of that and they allowed it to stay on there."


title: Bestgore.com

text: In June 2012, it was reported that the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal was investigating Bestgore.com for charges of obscenity due to the posting of "1 Lunatic 1 Ice Pick". The "Toronto Sun" claimed that charges were pending against Marek, which he denied.


title: Bestgore.com

text: On July 16, 2013, Edmonton police charged Marek with one count of "corrupting morals" in connection with posting the Magnotta video. The rare charge is based on section 163 of the Canadian Criminal Code and carries a maximum sentence of two years' imprisonment. One police investigator described the site as "a racist website, inciting hate, hatred, violence—violence above and beyond anything normal." Marek was released on bail, but was re-arrested on July 26 for allegedly violating the terms of his release. In January 2016, he pleaded guilty and was given a conditional sentence of three months of house arrest followed by three months of community service.


title: Bestgore.com

text: In a November 2013 interview with Adrianne Jeffries of "The Verge", Marek said that section 163(1) prohibits distribution of crime comics and methods of curing venereal disease, and noted that the law was enforced selectively and could be used indiscriminately. Marek also defended the value of actually looking at gory material:


title: Bestgore.com

text: Marek said that he would receive positive testimonies from readers—he reported that people viewing the website's content had sometimes convinced them to avoid making dangerous risks in their everyday life including speeding, darting between traffic on motorcycle, horseplay with forklifts, and even persuaded some not to commit suicide. Marek has noted that the Canadian government itself has used shocking images on cigarette packaging to discourage smoking.


title: Online shopping

text: Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the retailer directly or by searching among alternative vendors using a shopping search engine, which displays the same product's availability and pricing at different e-retailers. As of 2020, customers can shop online using a range of different computers and devices, including desktop computers, laptops, tablet computers and smartphones.


title: Online shopping

text: An online shop evokes the physical analogy of buying products or services at a regular "bricks-and-mortar" retailer or shopping center; the process is called business-to-consumer (B2C) online shopping. When an online store is set up to enable businesses to buy from another businesses, the process is called business-to-business (B2B) online shopping. A typical online store enables the customer to browse the firm's range of products and services, view photos or images of the products, along with information about the product specifications, features and prices.


title: Online shopping

text: Online stores usually enable shoppers to use "search" features to find specific models, brands or items. Online customers must have access to the Internet and a valid method of payment in order to complete a transaction, such as a credit card, an Interac-enabled debit card, or a service such as PayPal. For physical products (e.g., paperback books or clothes), the e-tailer ships the products to the customer; for digital products, such as digital audio files of songs or software, the e-tailer usually sends the file to the customer over the Internet. The largest of these online retailing corporations are Alibaba, Amazon.com, and eBay.


title: Online shopping

text: Alternative names for the activity are "e-tailing", a shortened form of "electronic retail" or "e-shopping", a shortened form of "electronic shopping". An online store may also be called an e-web-store, e-shop, e-store, Internet shop, web-shop, web-store, online store, online storefront and virtual store. Mobile commerce (or m-commerce) describes purchasing from an online retailer's mobile device-optimized website or software application ("app"). These websites or apps are designed to enable customers to browse through a companies' products and services on tablet computers and smartphones.


title: Online shopping

text: One of the earliest forms of trade conducted online was IBM's online transaction processing (OLTP) developed in the 1960s, which allowed the processing of financial transactions in real-time. The computerized ticket reservation system developed for American Airlines called Semi-Automatic Business Research Environment (SABRE) was one of its applications. There, computer terminals located in different travel agencies were linked to a large IBM mainframe computer, which processed transactions simultaneously and coordinated them so that all travel agents had access to the same information at the same time. At some point between 1971 and 1971, students at Stanford and MIT used the internet precursor ARPANET to make a deal to exchange marijuana, but the interaction doesn't qualify as e-commerce because no money was transferred online.


title: Online shopping

text: The emergence of online shopping as it is known today developed with the emergence of the Internet. Initially, this platform only functioned as an advertising tool for companies, providing information about their products. It quickly moved on from this simple utility to actual online shopping transaction due to the development of interactive Web pages and secure transmissions. Specifically, the growth of the Internet as a secure shopping channel has developed since 1994, with the first sales of Sting's album "Ten Summoner's Tales". Wine, chocolates, and flowers soon followed and were among the pioneering retail categories which fueled the growth of online shopping. Researchers found that having products that are appropriate for e-commerce was a key indicator of Internet success. Many of these products did well as they are generic products which shoppers did not need to touch and feel in order to buy. But also importantly, in the early days, there were few shoppers online and they were from a narrow segment: affluent, male, 30+. Online shopping has come a long way since those early days and – in the UK – accounts for significant percentage (depending on product category as percentages can vary).


title: Online shopping

text: As the revenues from online sales continued to grow significantly researchers identified different types of online shoppers, Rohm & Swaninathan identified four categories and named them ""convenience shoppers, variety seekers, balanced buyers, and store-oriented shoppers"". They focused on shopping motivations and found that the variety of products available and the perceived convenience of the buying online experience were significant motivating factors. This was different for offline shoppers, who were more motivated by time saving and recreational motives.


title: Online shopping

text: English entrepreneur Michael Aldrich was a pioneer of online shopping in 1979. His system connected a modified domestic TV to a real-time transaction processing computer via a domestic telephone line. He believed that videotex, the modified domestic TV technology with a simple menu-driven human–computer interface, was a 'new, universally applicable, participative communication medium — the first since the invention of the telephone.' This enabled 'closed' corporate information systems to be opened to 'outside' correspondents not just for transaction processing but also for e-messaging and information retrieval and dissemination, later known as e-business. His definition of the new mass communications medium as 'participative' [interactive, many-to-many] was fundamentally different from the traditional definitions of mass communication and mass media and a precursor to the social networking on the Internet 25 years later. In March 1980 he launched Redifon's Office Revolution, which allowed consumers, customers, agents, distributors, suppliers and service companies to be connected online to the corporate systems and allow business transactions to be completed electronically in real-time. During the 1980s he designed, manufactured, sold, installed, maintained and supported many online shopping systems, using videotex technology. These systems which also provided voice response and handprint processing pre-date the Internet and the World Wide Web, the IBM PC, and Microsoft MS-DOS, and were installed mainly in the UK by large corporations.


title: Online shopping

text: The first World Wide Web server and browser, created by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989, opened for commercial use in 1991. Thereafter, subsequent technological innovations emerged in 1994: online banking, the opening of an online pizza shop by Pizza Hut, Netscape's SSL v2 encryption standard for secure data transfer, and Intershop's first online shopping system. The first secure retail transaction over the Web was either by NetMarket or Internet Shopping Network in 1994. Immediately after, Amazon.com launched its online shopping site in 1995 and eBay was also introduced in 1995. Alibaba's sites Taobao and Tmall were launched in 2003 and 2008, respectively. Retailers are increasingly selling goods and services prior to availability through "pretail" for testing, building, and managing demand.


title: Online shopping

text: Statistics show that in 2012, Asia-Pacific increased their international sales over 30% giving them over $433 billion in revenue. That is a $69 billion difference between the U.S. revenue of $364.66 billion. It is estimated that Asia-Pacific will increase by another 30% in the year 2013 putting them ahead by more than one-third of all global ecommerce sales. The largest online shopping day in the world is Singles Day, with sales just in Alibaba's sites at US$9.3 billion in 2014.


title: Online shopping

text: Online customers must have access to the Internet and a valid method of payment in order to complete a transaction. Generally, higher levels of education and personal income correspond to more favorable perceptions of shopping online. Increased exposure to technology also increases the probability of developing favorable attitudes towards new shopping channels.


title: Online shopping

text: The marketing around the digital environment, customer's buying behaviour may not be influenced and controlled by the brand and firm, when they make a buying decision that might concern the interactions with search engine, recommendations, online reviews and other information. In modern shopping environments, people are more likely to use their mobile phones, computers, tablets and other digital devices to gather information. In an online shopping environment, interactive decision may have an influence on aid customer decision making, through online product reviews and user-generated content, typically provided through software from companies like Bazaarvoice and Trustpilot, or via social media. This content, which can include text or video-based reviews, customer photos, and feedback, is often displayed alongside products being sold on websites like Amazon, Target, and most other digital storefronts.


title: Online shopping

text: Subsequently, risk and trust would also are two important factors affecting people's' behavior in digital environments. Customers consider to switch between e-channels, because they are mainly influence by the comparison with offline shopping, involving growth of security, financial and performance-risks In other words, a customer shopping online that they may receive more risk than people shopping in stores. There are three factors may influence people to do the buying decision, firstly, people cannot examine whether the product satisfy their needs and wants before they receive it. Secondly, customer may concern at after-sale services. Finally, customer may afraid that they cannot fully understand the language used in e-sales. Based on those factors customer perceive risk may as a significantly reason influence the online purchasing behaviour.


title: Online shopping

text: Online retailers has place much emphasis on customer trust aspect, trust is another way driving customer's behaviour in digital environment, which can depend on customer's attitude and expectation. Indeed, the company's products design or ideas can not met customer's expectations. Customer's purchase intention based on rational expectations, and additionally impacts on emotional trust. Moreover, those expectations can be also establish on the product information and revision from others.


title: Online shopping

text: In several studies, perceived value, shopping style, and brand trust are the main factors that affect online consumers' decisions.  The perceived value means that people can compare the products and prices online, bringing them the perceived value of getting more benefits online than in an offline store. The comfortable environment that online shopping brings to customers can make consumers get more perceived value.


title: Online shopping

text: Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the retailer directly or by searching among alternative vendors using a shopping search engine. Users can compare and evaluate products using product information on the website, as well on other websites such as websites about product tests.


title: Online shopping

text: Once a particular product has been found and selected on the website of the seller, most online retailers use shopping cart software to allow the consumer to accumulate multiple items and to adjust quantities, like filling a physical shopping cart or basket in a conventional store. A "checkout" process follows (continuing the physical-store analogy) in which payment and delivery information is collected, if necessary. Some stores allow consumers to sign up for a permanent online account so that some or all of this information only needs to be entered once. The consumer often receives an e-mail confirmation once the transaction is complete. Less sophisticated stores may rely on consumers to phone or e-mail their orders (although full credit card numbers, expiry date, and Card Security Code, or bank account and routing number should not be accepted by e-mail, for reasons of security).


title: Online shopping

text: One of the great benefits of online shopping is the ability to read product reviews, written either by experts or fellow online shoppers. The Nielsen Company conducted a survey in March 2010 and polled more than 27,000 Internet users in 55 markets from the Asia-Pacific, Europe, Middle East, North America, and South America to look at questions such as "How do consumers shop online?", "What do they intend to buy?", "How do they use various online shopping web pages?", and the impact of social media and other factors that come into play when consumers are trying to decide how to spend their money on which product or service. According to the research, reviews on electronics (57%) such as DVD players, cellphones, or PlayStations, and so on, reviews on cars (45%), and reviews on software (37%) play an important role in influencing consumers who tend to make purchases online. Furthermore, 40% of online shoppers indicate that they would not even buy electronics without consulting online reviews first.


title: Online shopping

text: In addition to online reviews, peer recommendations on online shopping pages or social media websites play a key role for online shoppers when they are researching future purchases. 90% of all purchases made are influenced by social media.


title: Online shopping

text: Online shoppers commonly use a credit card or a PayPal account in order to make payments. However, some systems enable users to create accounts and pay by alternative means, such as:


title: Online shopping

text: Some online shops will not accept international credit cards. Some require both the purchaser's billing and shipping address to be in the same country as the online shop's base of operation. Other online shops allow customers from any country to send gifts anywhere. The financial part of a transaction may be processed in real time (e.g. letting the consumer know their credit card was declined before they log off), or may be done later as part of the fulfillment process.


title: Online shopping

text: Once a payment has been accepted, the goods or services can be delivered in the following ways. For physical items:


title: Online shopping

text: Simple shopping cart systems allow the off-line administration of products and categories. The shop is then generated as HTML files and graphics that can be uploaded to a webspace. The systems do not use an online database. A high-end solution can be bought or rented as a stand-alone program or as an addition to an enterprise resource planning program. It is usually installed on the company's web server and may integrate into the existing supply chain so that ordering, payment, delivery, accounting and warehousing can be automated to a large extent. Other solutions allow the user to register and create an online shop on a portal that hosts multiple shops simultaneously from one back office. Examples are BigCommerce, Shopify and FlickRocket. Open source shopping cart packages include advanced platforms such as Interchange, and off-the-shelf solutions such as Magento, osCommerce, WooCommerce, PrestaShop, and Zen Cart. Commercial systems can also be tailored so the shop does not have to be created from scratch. By using an existing framework, software modules for various functionalities required by a web shop can be adapted and combined.


title: Online shopping

text: Customers are attracted to online shopping not only because of high levels of convenience, but also because of broader selections, competitive pricing, and greater access to information. Business organizations seek to offer online shopping not only because it is of much lower cost compared to bricks and mortar stores, but also because it offers access to a worldwide market, increases customer value, and builds sustainable capabilities.


title: Online shopping

text: Designers of online shops are concerned with the effects of information load. Information load is a product of the spatial and temporal arrangements of stimuli in the web store. Compared with conventional retail shopping, the information environment of virtual shopping is enhanced by providing additional product information such as comparative products and services, as well as various alternatives and attributes of each alternative, etc. Two major dimensions of information load are complexity and novelty. Complexity refers to the number of different elements or features of a site, often the result of increased information diversity. Novelty involves the unexpected, suppressed, new, or unfamiliar aspects of the site. The novelty dimension may keep consumers exploring a shopping site, whereas the complexity dimension may induce impulse purchases.


title: Online shopping

text: Internet consumers are self-conscious and emphasize personalized consumption, which makes the demand for online consumption different. Online consumers have different needs depending on their time and environment. Even different online consumers have different needs at the same level of demand due to the difference in income level and other factors. Compared with the centralized nature of traditional markets, online consumption is more decentralized. In the online consumer market, consumers have a short decision time, a large variability of consumer demand, a large number of purchases, but a relatively small amount of each purchase, a considerable mobility of purchases, a strong substitutability of goods, and a large elasticity of demand. According to the output of a research report by Western Michigan University published in 2005, an e-commerce website does not have to be good looking with listing on a lot of search engines. It must build relationships with customers to make money. The report also suggests that a website must leave a positive impression on the customers, giving them a reason to come back. However, resent research has proven that sites with higher focus on efficiency, convenience, and personalised services increased the customers motivation to make purchases.


title: Online shopping

text: Dyn, an Internet performance management company conducted a survey on more than 1400 consumers across 11 countries in North America, Europe, Middle-East and Asia and the results of the survey are as follows:


title: Online shopping

text: The most important factors determining whether customers return to a website are ease of use and the presence of user-friendly features. Usability testing is important for finding problems and improvements in a web site. Methods for evaluating usability include heuristic evaluation, cognitive walkthrough, and user testing. Each technique has its own characteristics and emphasizes different aspects of the user experience.


title: Online shopping

text: The popularity of online shopping continues to erode sales of conventional retailers. For example, Best Buy, the largest retailer of electronics in the U.S. in August 2014 reported its tenth consecutive quarterly dip in sales, citing an increasing shift by consumers to online shopping. Amazon.com has the largest market share in the United States. As of May 2018, a survey found two-thirds of Americans had bought something from Amazon (92% of those who had bought anything online), with 40% of online shoppers buying something from Amazon at least once a month. The survey found shopping began at amazon.com 44% of the time, compared to a general search engine at 33%. It estimated 75 million Americans subscribe to Amazon Prime and 35 million more use someone else's account.


title: Online shopping

text: There were 242 million people shopping online in China in 2012. For developing countries and low-income households in developed countries, adoption of e-commerce in place of or in addition to conventional methods is limited by a lack of affordable Internet access.


title: Online shopping

text: Online stores are usually available 24 hours a day, and many consumers in Western countries have Internet access both at work and at home. Other establishments such as Internet cafes, community centers and schools provide internet access as well. In contrast, visiting a conventional retail store requires travel or commuting and costs such as gas, parking, or bus tickets, and must usually take place during business hours. Delivery was always a problem which affected the convenience of online shopping. Additionally, the online shopping industry has not only involved the concept of providing convenience for customers but also improved perceptions of social inclusion. However to overcome this many retailers including online retailers in Taiwan brought in a store pick up service. This now meant that customers could purchase goods online and pick them up at a nearby convenience store, making online shopping more advantageous to customers. In the event of a problem with the item (e.g., the product was not what the consumer ordered or the product was not satisfactory), consumers are concerned with the ease of returning an item in exchange for the correct product or a refund. Consumers may need to contact the retailer, visit the post office and pay return shipping, and then wait for a replacement or refund. Some online companies have more generous return policies to compensate for the traditional advantage of physical stores. For example, the online shoe retailer Zappos.com includes labels for free return shipping, and does not charge a restocking fee, even for returns which are not the result of merchant error. (Note: In the United Kingdom, online shops are prohibited from charging a restocking fee if the consumer cancels their order in accordance with the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Act 2000). A 2018 survey in the United States found 26% of online shoppers said they never return items, and another 65% said they rarely do so. Merchants may benefit from online shopping due to low sales inventory pressure, low operating costs, and the scale of operation is not limited by the site.


title: Online shopping

text: Especially in cases of large or heavy products, delivery can be not only more convenient but also not require having or using a car. Not using or depending on personal vehicles, which can have substantial impact on the environment, to travel to local stores can make online shopping more sustainable than buying in local stores if such are used otherwise (especially if items are bundled and delivery vehicles are electric and use optimized routes).


title: Online shopping

text: Online shopping is usually more informationally rich than shopping at physical stores traveled to and usually has higher comparability and customizability.


title: Online shopping

text: Online stores must describe products for sale with text, photos, and multimedia files, and sometimes have features such as question and answers or filters, whereas in a physical retail store, the actual product and the manufacturer's packaging will be available for direct inspection (which might involve a test drive, fitting, or other experimentation). Some online stores provide or link to supplemental product information, such as instructions, safety procedures, demonstrations, or manufacturer specifications. Some provide background information, advice, or how-to guides designed to help consumers decide which product to buy. Some stores even allow customers to comment or rate their items. There are also dedicated review sites that host user reviews for different products. Reviews and even some blogs give customers the option of shopping for cheaper purchases from all over the world without having to depend on local retailers. In a conventional retail store, clerks are generally available to answer questions. Some online stores have real-time chat features, but most rely on e-mails or phone calls to handle customer questions. Even if an online store is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the customer service team may only be available during regular business hours.


title: Online shopping

text: One advantage of shopping online is being able to quickly seek out deals for items or services provided by many different vendors (though some local search engines do exist to help consumers locate products for sale in nearby stores). Search engines, online price comparison services and discovery shopping engines can be used to look up sellers of a particular product or service. Shipping costs (if applicable) reduce the price advantage of online merchandise, though depending on the jurisdiction, a lack of sales tax may compensate for this. Shipping a small number of items, especially from another country, is much more expensive than making the larger shipments bricks-and-mortar retailers order. Some retailers (especially those selling small, high-value items like electronics) offer free shipping on sufficiently large orders. Another major advantage for retailers is the ability to rapidly switch suppliers and vendors without disrupting users' shopping experience.


title: Online shopping

text: Given the lack of ability to inspect merchandise before purchase, consumers are at higher risk of fraud than face-to-face transactions. When ordering merchandise online, the item may not work properly, it may have defects, or it might not be the same item pictured in the online photo. Merchants also risk fraudulent purchases if customers are using stolen credit cards or fraudulent repudiation of the online purchase. However, merchants face less risk from physical theft by using a warehouse instead of a retail storefront. Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption has generally solved the problem of credit card numbers being intercepted in transit between the consumer and the merchant. However, one must still trust the merchant (and employees) not to use the credit card information subsequently for their own purchases, and not to pass the information to others. Also, hackers might break into a merchant's web site and steal names, addresses and credit card numbers, although the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard is intended to minimize the impact of such breaches. Identity theft is still a concern for consumers. A number of high-profile break-ins in the 2000s has prompted some U.S. states to require disclosure to consumers when this happens. Computer security has thus become a major concern for merchants and e-commerce service providers, who deploy countermeasures such as firewalls and anti-virus software to protect their networks. Phishing is another danger, where consumers are fooled into thinking they are dealing with a reputable retailer, when they have actually been manipulated into feeding private information to a system operated by a malicious party. Denial of service attacks are a minor risk for merchants, as are server and network outages.


title: Online shopping

text: Quality seals can be placed on the Shop web page if it has undergone an independent assessment and meets all requirements of the company issuing the seal. The purpose of these seals is to increase the confidence of online shoppers. However, the existence of many different seals, or seals unfamiliar to consumers, may foil this effort to a certain extent.


title: Online shopping

text: A number of resources offer advice on how consumers can protect themselves when using online retailer services. These include:


title: Online shopping

text: Although the benefits of online shopping are considerable, when the process goes poorly it can create a thorny situation. A few problems that shoppers potentially face include identity theft, faulty products, and the accumulation of spyware. If users are required to put in their credit card information and billing/shipping address and the website is not secure, customer information can be accessible to anyone who knows how to obtain it. Most large online corporations are inventing new ways to make fraud more difficult. However, criminals are constantly responding to these developments with new ways to manipulate the system. Even though online retailers are making efforts to protect consumer information, it is a constant fight to maintain the lead. It is advisable to be aware of the most current technology and scams to protect consumer identity and finances. Product delivery is also a main concern of online shopping. Most companies offer shipping insurance in case the product is lost or damaged. Some shipping companies will offer refunds or compensation for the damage, but this is up to their discretion.


title: Online shopping

text: The lack of full cost disclosure may also be problematic. While it may be easy to compare the base price of an item online, it may not be easy to see the total cost up front. Additional fees such as shipping are often not visible until the final step in the checkout process. The problem is especially evident with cross-border purchases, where the cost indicated at the final checkout screen may not include additional fees that must be paid upon delivery such as duties and brokerage. Some services such as the Canadian-based Wishabi attempts to include estimates of these additional cost, but nevertheless, the lack of general full cost disclosure remains a concern.


title: Online shopping

text: Privacy of personal information is a significant issue for some consumers. Many consumers wish to avoid spam and telemarketing which could result from supplying contact information to an online merchant. In response, many merchants promise to not use consumer information for these purposes, Many websites keep track of consumer shopping habits in order to suggest items and other websites to view. Brick-and-mortar stores also collect consumer information. Some ask for a shopper's address and phone number at checkout, though consumers may refuse to provide it. Many larger stores use the address information encoded on consumers' credit cards (often without their knowledge) to add them to a catalog mailing list. This information is obviously not accessible to the merchant when paying in cash or through a bank (money transfer, in which case there is also proof of payment).


title: Online shopping

text: Many successful purely virtual companies deal with digital products, (including information storage, retrieval, and modification), music, movies, office supplies, education, communication, software, photography, and financial transactions. Other successful marketers use drop shipping or affiliate marketing techniques to facilitate transactions of tangible goods without maintaining real inventory. Some non-digital products have been more successful than others for online stores. Profitable items often have a high value-to-weight ratio, they may involve embarrassing purchases, they may typically go to people in remote locations, and they may have shut-ins as their typical purchasers. Items which can fit in a standard mailbox—such as music CDs, DVDs and books—are particularly suitable for a virtual marketer.


title: Online shopping

text: Products such as spare parts, both for consumer items like washing machines and for industrial equipment like centrifugal pumps, also seem good candidates for selling online. Retailers often need to order spare parts specially, since they typically do not stock them at consumer outlets—in such cases, e-commerce solutions in spares do not compete with retail stores, only with other ordering systems. A factor for success in this niche can consist of providing customers with exact, reliable information about which part number their particular version of a product needs, for example by providing parts lists keyed by serial number. Products less suitable for e-commerce include products that have a low value-to-weight ratio, products that have a smell, taste, or touch component, products that need trial fittings—most notably clothing—and products where colour integrity appears important. Nonetheless, some web sites have had success delivering groceries and clothing sold through the internet is big business in the U.S.


title: Online shopping

text: High-volume websites, such as Yahoo!, Amazon.com and eBay offer hosting services for online stores to all size retailers. These stores are presented within an integrated navigation framework, sometimes known as virtual shopping malls or online marketplaces.


title: Dev Patel

text: Dev Patel (; born 23 April 1990) is a British actor. His breakthrough came in 2008 with the leading role of Jamal Malik in Danny Boyle's drama "Slumdog Millionaire", for which Patel was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, becoming one of the youngest nominees in Best Actor category. He won the Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Young Performer and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture.