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Ah, if cybergifts be the food of love, click on. Especially if cash is a little short, these two sites may be just the places to order your Valentine a little remembrance or two. The price is right: it's "freebie" time in cyberspace.
The first, Virtualflowers, is the winner of Mecklermedia's 1997 IMPACT award. There you will be able to pick out a "virtual bouquet" of your choice, write out a card of affection or deep regard (or a funny valentine, for that matter). Send it off, free of charge, and the "robot florist" will deliver a message via E-mail to your loved one. Then with any graphical WWW browser (like Netscape, Internet Explorer or Mosaic), the recipient will go in with a claim number and voila, cyberflowers beyond compare delivered with your greetings. One caveat: Since this site "delivers" between 5,000 and 10,000 "bouquets" a day, you may have to be persistent in accessing the flower selection page. Keep at it and you'll get in. The cyber-delivery will stay fresh and lively (although the scent leaves something to be desired) for a full seven days. You can also order real flowers to be delivered, but there's an exchange of money involved, so we'll go now to the second freebie.
The Electric Postcard, brought to you by the folks at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), allows you to choose paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Gauguin, Hopper, Hockney, Monet, Magritte and a host of others, graphics and posters from a variety of places, images from space and insect drawings. Pick a card, write a message and send it off. The recipient will be notified by E-mail that a card has been sent and they can claim it at the Pick-up Window, for two weeks, using their graphical browser. So far, two million cards have been sent, thanks to the MIT Media Lab.