Articles by Lori Enos

Buying a piece of fame online is easy because thousands of online celebrity auctions fill the pages of such Web action sites as Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) and eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) every day. Understanding the factors that motivate sellers and buyers of celebrity mementos, however, takes some study....

Stricter laws are needed to protect Internet auction users from spammers who harvest e-mail addresses from auction sites, an eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) executive told U.S. lawmakers at a House subcommittee on crime hearing on cybercrime Thursday "It is worth noting that some forms of cybercrime could be reduced if Congress were to adopt a criminal prohibi...

Priceline.com(Nasdaq: PCLN) has been working hard to improve its customer service andfind the right product mix, but analysts still disagree about whetherthe "name-your-own-price" e-tailer has a business model that will succeed "I don't believe Pricelinehas a long-term business model," Jupiter Media Metrix analystJared Blank told the E-Commerce Tim...

Although online credit card fraud is not a myth, its frequency has been greatly exaggerated, according to a survey released Wednesday by Jupiter Media Metrix The report, "Overhyped and Misunderstood: The Fraud of Online Fraud," said that the attention focused on online security incidents has led consumers to believe that fraud is approximately 12 t...

Cybercrime fighters are scheduled to continue lobbying U.S. Congress on Thursday for more money and power to combat hackers, con artists and other cyber crooks "No one knows the full extent of the fraud being committed on the Internet," Thomas T. Kubic, deputy assistant director for the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), told the House of ...

While U.S. lawmakers have failed to stop the flood of unsolicited commercial e-mail-- otherwise known as spam -- clogging e-mail boxes across the nation, many savvy netizens are turning to SpamCop.net, a tool that helps consumers filter out spam and report spammers to their Internet service providers (ISPs). Julian Haight, the Seattle, Washington ...

Electronics e-tailer X10.com leapfrogged over Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) and eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) in the May rankings of the Top 50 most visited Web sites, according to a report released Wednesday by Jupiter Media Metrix Driven by a "pop-up" and "pop-under" ad strategy that accounted for 95 percent of its traffic, X10.com moved up in the rankings fro...

Duet, the online music venture backed by Sony Music Entertainment and Universal Music Group (UMG), has been renamed Pressplay, the companies said Monday The companies also said that two former UMG executives would be taking the reins of the new company. Pressplay's new president and chief executive officer will be Andy Schuon, formerly president an...

The European Commission (EC) is investigating potential anti-competitive aspects of two major new online music ventures, Duet and MusicNet, an EC official said Monday Speaking at the third European Union (EU) Competition Day, EC competition minister Mario Monti said that the EC is investigating Duet, backed by Vivendi Universal (NYSE: V) and Sony M...

Broadband Internet service provider Excite@Home (Nasdaq: ATHM) announced Monday that it has raised US$100 million through the sale of five-year convertible secured notes Purchasers of the notes, which bear no interest, can convert them at any time into Excite@Home Series A common stock at $4.38, a 10 percent premium over Friday's weighted average t...

Thursday, the Washington State Supreme Court unanimously overturned a lower court ruling that had struck down the state's anti-spam law The high court ruled that the only burden the law places on spammers is the requirement of truthfulness -- which in fact does not burden interstate commerce, but actually helps it by eliminating fraud....

Automakers hoping to leverage the power of the Internet to generate new car sales need to concentrate less on online selling and more on building brand awareness, according to a report released Thursday by Jupiter Media Metrix "Given that most consumers will ultimately purchase an automobile offline, automotive advertisers will see little benefit i...

In a world where Internet-only players are flying off the screen at an alarming pace, Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) is likely to succeed where other pure-plays have failed, analysts from Jupiter Media Metrix told the E-Commerce Times. The e-tail giant itself said this week that it is on track to deliver pro forma profitability in the fourth quarter of...

Because WhatsHotNow.com (WHN) abruptly closed its e-commerce services division, the e-tail operations of a number of TV Web sites, including Comedy Central, NBC and TV Guide, have had to shut down this week "[WHN] said they were negotiating an acquisition, and if that didn't happen they would have to shut down," Comedy Central senior vice president...

American Express (NYSE: AXP) launched a new company Tuesday, dubbed Workadia, which is aimed at capturing a share of the corporate portal market. Workadia will provide businesses with customizable browser-accessed portals that employees can use to access a company-selected menu of services, including such options as financial services, e-mail, exp...

Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) is still on track to deliver pro forma profitability in the fourth quarter of this year and expects to be profitable on the same basis for all of 2002, the company said Tuesday "While there can never be guarantees, you will hear from us that we are highly confident about our ability to deliver pro forma operating profits i...

Delivery e-tailer Webvan (Nasdaq: WBVN) started a same-day service for some of its Seattle, Washington customers Tuesday The company said it will test same-day delivery in the Seattle market and then evaluate expanding the service to the other markets it serves....

A sister enterprise of United Airlines (NYSE: UAL) announced Monday that it has signed an agreement to acquire Internet loyalty site MyPoints.com (Nasdaq: MYPT) in a cash deal valued at approximately US$112.5 million United NewVentures, which manages United Airlines' Internet initiatives and investments, said it would use MyPoints' "strong direct m...

More than a year after first being announced, controversial travel mega-site Orbitz officially launched Monday Chicago-based Orbitz said that at launch, it already had 175,000 registered users and had sold US$3.5 million in tickets. In addition to airfare, Orbitz offers consumers hotel and rental car reservations and cruise packages....

Covisint, the business-to-business (B2B) automotive e-marketplace backed by the major car companies, is taking longer than expected to ramp up -- and experts agree that the delays could mean that Covisint will not be the driving force it had hoped to be Covisint is moving "slower than they should to have the impact they want to," Forrester Research...