Not everything needs to be completely efficient, experienced through a computer or mobile phone screen, nor does it need to be "researched extensively". Some people prefer the option of a tactile, in-person, sometimes social experience of browsing physical objects.

If you're buying art, then yeah - go to a gallery.

If you're buying a shrink-wrapped GPU, then I think you're romanticizing what a big box store adds to that transaction.

If you want to build a full pc, they will walk you through every component. They will optimize a build around your budget as well. i’ve had employees hand me replacements in my carts that were both better and cheaper that I overlooked. There is a bunch of overlooked value from businesses like MicroCenter that the younger generation has never even experienced.

Man, it's been a long time since someone has implied that I'm part of anything young. I'll tell my optometrist!

Has nothing to do with whether it's art or a shrink-wrapped product, different people value different things. As an example, a vehicle may be an engineering wonder or a work of art to one person and a "silly mass-produced hunk of steel" to another.

And yes, I am romanticizing in-person experiences and interactions over the insistence that more and more things in life are best experienced through a phone or computer.

Hanging out in a big box electronics store is a wildly dystopian interpretation of "in-person experiences and interactions".

I don't expect to establish friendships while shopping. It's never even occurred to me.

Isn't it wild that traditional bricks and mortar retail is now considered - not just "dystopian" - but "wildly dystopian" and perusing Amazon while on the toilet is now considered not dystopian? How times have changed!

I have never "established a friendship" while shopping, at least not that I can recall. But I have gone to a store with a friend as a social activity to browse for goods together. Pretty common experience from what I have seen.

The truth is that I have yet to establish the sort of friendships that will help me carry an iPad to my car.