AN OXFORD company is planning to spend £1.4m on helping computer greenhorns through the virtual quagmire of electronic wizardry.

Dream Direct, of Aristotle Lane, is offering plain English instead of jargon to guide customers through the maze of products and software.

Directors of Dreams Direct, Robert Colquhoun and Ollie Vintcent, intend to take the nightmare out of buying software by using mass marketing techniques such as distributing a 32-page catalogue with national newspapers.

Mr Vintcent said: "The majority of UK consumers are still confused by the array of games, multimedia and education that they can use on their computers.

"They are frankly intimidated by the exclusive, jargon-filled, world of computing and lack of advice available to them from High Street sources and other direct sources."

He added: "We intend to fill the gap in the market by providing consumers with a helping hand and becoming the pre-eminent direct seller of home software and hand-held hardware in the UK."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.