AUTOMATED ACQUISITION AND CONFIGURATION OF GOODS AND SERVICES VIA A NETWORK

A computer performs a method of communicating with a referral server to identify configurables available to the computer based on the computer's location and at least one other factor. The computer receives a list of provider servers selected by the referral server for referring to the computer because the provider servers on the list auto-configure configurables in the computer's location and according to the at least one other factor. The method communicates with a provider server selected from the list to purchase a selected configurable and to auto-configure the computer's computing environment to operate the selected configurable. The method communicates with the referral server to provide a metric about the provider server's performance during purchase and auto-configure.