Articles by Paul A. Greenberg

While most of us are busy breaking out our deck chairs and SPF 45 at this time of year, online toy companies are already counting down to their hottest time of the year -- the winter shopping season E-commerce has been somewhat brutal to toy retailers, but though still volatile and unpredictable, the online toy sector is evolving and could prove ki...

Those who have faithfully followed the 21st-century battle that is Napster vs. the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) now know one critical fact. Napster is going mainstream and blending in, vanilla-like, with corporate America. One might wonder what happened to Napster's revolutionary spirit. Its renegade founder. Its cutting-edge c...

The ongoing online music wars have taken an interesting turn Executives with digital music companies went before the U.S. Congress and essentially asked legislators to change U.S. copyright laws to accommodate the needs of their business....

It has been almost a year since former President Bill Clinton signed into law the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce (E-SIGN) Act That was the legislation that cleared the way for digital signatures, a move many thought would be pivotal in catapulting electronic commerce into this millennium. Suddenly, everything from auto loans ...

Two of the world's largest media industries have notfigured out what to do with each other Movies and the Internet, arguably the two mostpopular entertainment and commerce vehicles, somehowcan't seem to find a way to shake hands....

The forces of digital evil could be lurking nearby at any time Those forces show up in the form of Internet fraud, and even those who should be protecting you are coming up short in the war on the perpetrators....

This is the story of a man who fell to earth and landed in a field of cash -- soft, comforting, fortuitous cash His name is George T. Shaheen, and in case I forgot to mention it, he fell with the aid of a parachute. Some might say the parachute was golden....

Most consumers, when faced with the task ofcomparison shopping for a desired item, do not havetime to run all over town looking to save a few dollars Still, saving money is important to most consumers, andthat's where the Internet was supposed to fill thegap. Where real-world shoppers feel a shortage of time and energy, e-shoppers are supposed to g...

For those who have faithfully followed the e-commerce and high-tech headlines, one of last year's hot topics was the emergence of wireless services As far back as a year ago, I wrote a story asking the question on everybody's mind: What's taking wireless so long?...

Will Americans ever feel comfortable enough with electronic commerce to buy a house via the Internet? The answer depends on whom you ask, but some industry observers say that unless we start incorporating major transactions into our Internet mix, e-commerce will remain an infant.

Those easy, breezy first few years of online selling were a time of unbridled commercialism, entrepreneurial mayhem and a general free-for-all Now that electronic commerce is entering a period of refinement, not only are entire businesses shutting their online doors, but individual products are becoming obsolete.

Deep into the second quarter of the year and after months spent struggling to survive, e-tailers are finally shifting their focus back to the basics, including, of course, consumer privacy With the economy finally showing signs of stabilizing, Web merchants are confronting the issue of who should serve as regulator of online privacy -- private indu...

Before "E" had anything to do with commerce, way back in the 1990s, the "e-word" usually referred to empowerment Have e-tailers forgotten the essential lessons of not-so-long ago? Consumers like to be in the driver's seat, and just because we have introduced a new genre of shopping does not mean we can take that away....

If you were an angel in Brooklyn, would you bless a new dot-com or a corner grocery store? No, not that kind of angel. I'm talking about another genre -- private individuals who contribute to funds that are meant to help entrepreneurs have a shot at the big time.

The Internet was supposed to allow us to have a world without borders. A world in which a guy in New Jersey could buy tea from London and sweaters from Switzerland with a few simple keystrokes Unfortunately, the borderless nature of the World Wide Web -- arguably the attribute that makes it so attractive to electronic commerce -- has become one of ...

Readers far and near will be crossing their fingers, no doubt, in the hopes that I win round trip airfare for two to any destination in North America, compliments of Orbitz.com You know Orbitz, even though you still can't book travel reservations there. For almost two years now, I've been kind enough to periodically remind you of its imminent arriv...

Although people can argue over how old the Internet is, if you say 1994 was the birth year, the Web is 7 years old. The age that everyone agrees is the Age of Reason When growing an emerging industry like e-commerce, some weeks are better than others. Yet the past few days have been really good.

The annual uproar among online consumers who try to return merchandise bought via the Internet generally occurs around the Christmas holidays, but some e-tailers make it tough on buyers all year long As someone who frequently shops online, I am highly motivated and persistent when it comes to researching the return policies of various Web merchants...

For those who think Koogle, Singh, Rubenstein and Mallet is a law firm, Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) wants you to know otherwise This mighty quartet of international Internet business minds once helmed one of the most powerful new economy companies in the world. Now, all but one, chief operating officer Jeff Mallett, have resigned, and some industry obser...

Is it just me or is Amazon chief Jeff Bezos' wide-eyed, Andy Kaufman-like, perpetual grin starting to wear a little thin? What once was the quirky face of the revolutionary potential of electronic commerce is now simply an eerie plastered expression of who knows what. I have a feeling behind that odd grin is a whole lot of emotional strife.