What better way to bring in the New Year than indulge in a mad orgy... of consumer spending.

The fastest shopper out the blocks, that we've heard of, is the Jungle.com customer who bought the John Shuttleworth Live video at 00:01am 2001. At just one minute into the New Year, whoever it was certainly didn't have time to complete a verse of Auld Lang Syne before they got their credit card out.

Over at BOL.com, someone very cultured (so probably not totally pissed up), bought a video of Jacqueline Du Pre performing The Elgar Cello Concerto and The Trout, 15 minutes into the New Year.

In the IT world someone couldn't wait for their £78.72 128Mb RAM, Jornada 540 AC Adaptor and so got onto Dabs.com at 00:58am 2001. To be fair, the shopper had a Spanish surname and so it might have been 01:58am their time, so they could have got quite a few snogs and drinks in before thrashing the plastic.

Dabs also flogged a AMD Duron 700Mhz + Cooler Fan, for £59.92, at 01:04. The company had 830 orders and created 400 new accounts on New Years Day.

Amazon.co.uk had a customer buying Kylie's album Light Years at 00.59am, but they were from Australia so it was probably a reasonable time of day over there. Good to see they're supporting their fellow countrywoman.

Dabs MD David Atherton doesn't really subscribe to either of my New Year shopping theories: people are either pissed up and saying what the hell, I'll spend some money; or they're stone cold sober saddos with nothing better to do.

"I think that some people don't particularly celebrate at Christmas/New Year. For example, we were talking about this in the pub last week, and although Christmas Eve/New Years Eve are de rigeur for UK/US people, it is less so in other countries and cultures. France's big thing is (oddly) Hallowe'en. Catholic countries make more of a fuss of Jan 5th (Eve of Epiphany) etc.", he said

Happy New Year. ®