Articles by Paul A. Greenberg

On what CEO Jeff Bezos likely hoped was the first day of the rest of a long and prosperous online life, Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) on Tuesday showed the world how important a penny can be That is the per-share net profit that resulted from Amazon's fourth-quarter earnings of US$5 million....

E-commerce is alive and well online. Those who want solid evidence need look no further than the online travel industry As one of the few consumer industries that has established itself and shown measurable growth on the Internet, online travel is no longer focused on basic survival. Instead, the industry is concentrating on its quest for the ingre...

The United States government is coming up with a business plan -- an information technology business plan, that is. Some might say it is not a moment too soon for the government to recognize the power and pervasiveness of technology Last week, President George W. Bush took a major step forward in this regard with his appointment of Norman Lorentz a...

Until recently, e-commerce was an exercise in trial and error, a hit-or-miss playing field in which all newcomers were welcome, but where few stuck around for long By now, those of us who have watched the industry blossom have seen what does not work -- over-spending, poor or non-existent business plans, inexperienced management. As for what does w...

Among all the entrepreneurs in the e-commerce industries, standing firmly in the middle of the post-September 11th commercial fray is one Richard S. Braddock As chairman of name-your-own-price Web site Priceline.com (Nasdaq: PCLN), Braddock continues to show the acumen necessary for longevity in Internet retailing.

If there is one word to describe U.S. Representative Bob Goodlatte, (R-Virginia), that word is persistent Goodlatte, arguably the most outspoken opponent of Internet gambling, has been trying to pass an anti-gambling bill for years. Every time legislators or industry leaders find a problem with one of his efforts, Goodlatte revises the bill to assu...

With industry analysts telling us that e-shopping is already brisk, and online holiday sales are projected to be high, it would seem e-tailing is on the upswing Yet, the highly respected Federated Department Stores (NYSE: FD) chose the busy holiday season to announce plans to scale back two of its most high profile Web sites, Macys.com and Blooming...

Those of us who discovered the relative ease of booking travel online were primed and ready for the debut of Orbitz this past summer The company's premise -- an independent operation dedicated to offering the lowest published fares from 30 airline companies -- seemed like an ideal business proposition to many of us....

Like millions of other American consumers, I spent several hours in a shopping mall the day after Thanksgiving. It was an old-fashioned between-holidays shopping excursion, with trips to Gap (NYSE: GPS), JC Penney (NYSE: JCP), et al -- and completely devoid of any mention of e-commerce....

Last week on Capitol Hill, when the U.S. Senate approved a two-year extension of the moratorium on Internet taxation, the entire e-commerce industry drew closer to the biggest reprieve it has ever received. With the White House indicating that George W. Bush will sign the pending bill, it appears that Congress and the president have joined forces ...

At first, the idea of digital books sounded so futuristic. Even so, we wrote it off as another passing innovation Nevertheless, the major publishing houses have worked at plans to enhance their presence in the e-book marketplace....

Remarkably, it has been almost two months since the terrorist attacks on the United States, and e-tailers are already having to focus on holiday sales The clear leader among online merchants still seems to be Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN). Why? Probably because its leader, eternally-smiling Jeff Bezos, seems bent on innovation for the sake of growth....

Much of the buzz around office water coolers lately has to do with the government's new powers to follow our every move on the Internet. When couched in language that makes it appear that such surveillance might help prevent further terrorist attacks on the U.S., many Americans are willing to forgo or compromise certain civil liberties. After all,...

The Internet, once considered to be populated predominantly by men, is in reality an equal opportunity channel This year, for example, Nielsen//NetRatings reaffirmed other studies which have reported that more than half of North American Internet users are women. While the female online population has been steadily growing, according to NetRatings,...

For those who have tried to re-finance their homes in the past few weeks, the routine goes something like this: Hurry up and wait With interest rates plummeting and an unstable economy that promises more layoffs and corporate downsizing, Americans are doing everything they can to reduce their expenses. Reducing an old home with an interest rate tha...

At this time of year, the main topic among e-commerce pundits and industry observers is which online companies will emerge victorious during the coming holiday season As was the case last year, when the dot-com shakeout began in earnest, this year's conversation has a sense of urgency, as we wonder which e-tailers will survive the season.

Just days ago in this column I was celebrating the manner in which the Old Economy and the New Economy had found a common ground for online music. Was it a bit premature? Perhaps....

In the first few weeks after the terrorist attacks on the United States, the dot-com world scratched its collective head, wondering if the economy would ever stabilize Some online merchants have passed that phase and are now focusing on how to survive until they see daylight again.

By now, observers of the various e-commerce markets can see which business models work online and which do not Online travel sites? Check. Online bookstores?Check. Online music? At first glance, no. But guess what? Check....

When money is being exchanged, chances are that somebody sometime is going to cheat. Unfortunately, that's the case whether the money is being spent for products, services or philanthropic causes The process of exchanging money electronically is ripe for fraud, a fact that has not been lost on a number of scam artists in the weeks since September 1...