E-Commerce

What risks do site owners run by having poorly written Terms of Service (ToS) or Click Agreements -- or none at all? If your company offers goods or services through its website (or for that matter, if downloads or advice are offered for a cost -- or even for free), when was the last time you looked...

California lawmakers have reached a compromise with Amazon over state sales tax, ending a back and forth battle that has raged all summer. State lawmakers approved a compromise bill that will give Amazon a one-year break from collecting state sales tax. Amazon's stock price rose nearly 5 percent on ...

More than 50 percent of e-commerce shoppers cited shipping as a reason for abandoning their shopping carts online, according to recent research. Furthermore, 43 percent of consumers' retailer choices were influenced by their delivery experiences and options, another study found. When you consider ho...

After the firing of Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz this week, the board is reportedly exploring a possibility of a sale. In coming months, there may be a sale of Yahoo's Asian investments, a purchase of a social media or content company, or partnerships that could help Yahoo get more money from its Web prope...

Yahoo on Wednesday announced a leadership reorganization that moves Carol Bartz out as CEO and replaces her in the interim with Timothy Morse, the company's chief financial officer. The board has also formed a new executive leadership council populated by key senior executives to support Morse in da...

Online coupon retailer Groupon is reevaluating its plans to go forward with its IPO following a volatile summer market, according to a recent report. The daily discount company originally announced its plans to go public in June and was rumored to be counting on a valuation of around $20 billion, wi...

You might have seen them without knowing what they are: little black and white boxes with squiggles and lines in the corner of a magazine advertisement, on a band's poster in a coffeeshop, or even on a T-shirt. Those things, called "QR codes," or "quick response codes," are part of a whole new way ...

Now that summer is ending, brand owners need to think about which brand names they will opt out of registering for the .XXX top level domain name Sunrise B launch. As most people are aware, the .XXX registry will be the first TLD targeted at the adult entertainment industry. Trademark owners outsid...

Esther Dyson, the Great Dame of Silicon Valley, at times matriarch to Bill Gates and many other lads on the innovation circuit, wrote a harsh column Aug. 26 about ICANN's gTLD system, titled "What's in a Domain Name?" I like and respect Esther, especially for her technical background -- we have shar...

When Google settled with the U.S. Department of Justice for $500 million over accusations that it allowed Canadian pharmaceutical companies to illegally place ads on its network, it may have thought its troubles with this issue were over. It was wrong. A shareholder has filed suit against the compa...

Barnes & Noble released its first-quarter earnings report on Tuesday, revealing that sales of its Nook e-reader and e-books have been helping to offset the company's sinking physical book sales. Total revenue was up 2 percent to $1.42 billion. Store revenue was down 3 percent to $1 billion. Onli...

Barnes & Noble released its first-quarter earnings report on Tuesday, revealing that sales of its Nook e-reader and e-books have been helping to offset the company's sinking physical book sales. Total revenue was up 2 percent to $1.42 billion. Store revenue was down 3 percent to $1 billion. Onli...

The latest innovations in SEO are definitely social signals and how they impact search results. We are seeing a shift in the authority scores that Google is weighing. It is not based solely on in-bound links and page content, but also on the amount of social sharing and social signals that you actua...

Internet radio service Pandora announced its first results as a publicly traded company on Thursday. Quarterly revenues totaled $67 million, 117 percent up year over year, and listener hours hit a new high of 1.8 billion, up 125 percent YoY, Pandora said. Advertising revenue more than doubled, from ...

The cocooned gTLD has started to spread its wings, and soon it will show its colors and become a butterfly. Its well-guarded fuzzy and slow progress has finally propelled it to a much-anticipated metamorphosis, but the world still waits for some flying maneuvers. Mother ICANN has worked very hard to...