E-Commerce

It might be a fad. It may be a trend or something even more permanent. Nonetheless, it's obvious that at least for now, blogging has arrived as a force on the Internet, not only for political discourse and personal ramblings but increasingly as a potentially powerful business tool. Any doubt that bl...

Striving to keep pace with its larger rivals in the search space even as it becomes part of the InterActive Corp. online empire, Ask Jeeves has debuted two features that it says will result in more accurate search results. Ask Jeeves said its features called "Zoom" and "Web Answers" would result in ...

With the help of a racy ad featuring Paris Hilton and outcry from watchdog groups such as the Parents Television Council (PTC), Carl's Jr. has scored a hit so big it just may be hotter than the spicy burger the ubiquitous heiress so suggestively eats in the spot. Along with the 30-second commercial,...

Looking to give users one more reason why they should become and stay loyal Yahoo users, the Web portal has unveiled a test version of a new e-mail service that it says makes it easier and faster to share digital photographs. PhotoMail, which debuted in beta form for testing among users of Yahoo Mai...

Online retail sales grew by nearly 24 percent in 2004 and will grow another 22 percent in 2005 as consumers continue to be drawn in droves to the convenience of e-commerce and as retailers become better at converting online shoppers into buyers, according to a new report. The State of Retailing Onli...

As eBusiness drives more business, it is attracting more sophisticated marketers who bring with them classic training in marketing research methods from places like P&G. These marketers understand how critical customer research is in guiding their decisions in product development, messaging and ...

A host of gaming developers are using the Electronic Entertainment Expo to herald the widespread availability of direct-download games for mobile phones, a sign that gaming could join digital music and other services at the forefront of the mobile commerce trend. Electronic Arts, which is touting ei...

In the clearest sign yet that it wants to compete with rivals such as Yahoo and MSN in the portal business as well as pure search, Google has given users the ability to customize their Google home pages. The Google personalization feature enables users to fold a dozen different types of content into...

America Online may have hit on the perfect way to get the name Netscape back into the midst of the browser wars with Netscape 8.0, unveiled today. At least one analyst has said that Web users should seriously consider switching to the browser, which has been in public beta testing since March. "In s...

Wal-Mart and Netflix have struck an agreement that calls for the retail giant to bow out of the online DVD rental business, a potentially huge victory for Netflix, but one that might only forestall the inevitable decline of the rental business amid the rise of video-on-demand. Under the agreement, N...

In a bid to beef up its instant messaging product and provide users with another reason to make it their Web portal of choice, Yahoo has rolled out an upgraded version of its Yahoo Messenger tool that features enhanced PC calling services. Yahoo launched what it's calling a "public beta" of its upgr...

Earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down some states' regulations limiting out-of-state shipments of wine. The ruling could help spur some e-commerce sales of wine, at least among individual vineyards. However, such sales are a small fraction of the overall market for wine, by most acco...

Pushing the boundaries of Internet video, the British Broadcasting Company (BBC), has announced plans to test a program that would make full-length versions of its television shows available for download. The TV programs, which would be available free of charge, would be protected with digital right...

In what could be a huge boost for some e-commerce players, the U.S. Supreme Court today struck down state laws barring consumers from buying wine and having the seller ship it across state borders. The 5-4 decision, handed down early today, dealt directly with state laws in Michigan and New York but...

Marketers have always wanted to track their customers' every move. Now, new scanning technologies linked to the Internet, may enable them to do so. Earlier this month ratings service Arbitron, Inc. and advertising specialty producer VNU disclosed that they have agreed to deploy during the next nine ...