Spotlight Features

Online shopping has hit the US$211 billion mark, according to Forrester Research. It is no wonder, then, that a plethora of shopping comparison sites have sprung up, all purporting to help people find their way to -- and through -- the hundred of thousands of Web-based stores. Many of these comparis...

Most of us are quite aware of a new, brewing scandal -- the stock option scandal. It has been revealed that some companies have "cooked the books" when it came to reporting dates of stock option grants. The purpose of misdating the stock option was to accommodate executives by giving them the possi...

Last year, the average click fraud rate of pay-per-click advertisements appearing on search engine content networks rose to 19.2 percent for the last quarter of 2006, the highest yet, according to Tom Cuthbert, CEO of Click Forensics. Click fraud occurs when online advertisers pay search engine comp...

The Internet has presented previously unimaginable opportunities for enterprises of all types, including financial services institutions. Online transactions are at an all-time high as enterprises enthusiastically cultivate the Internet as a vital sales channel. Careful examination of consumer beha...

Change is the order of the day in the m-commerce market. New smartphones and other handheld digital devices are hitting the marketplace in a torrent, as media convergence accelerates the drive toward "quad play" devices and network services. The telecom and media industries are undergoing a fundamen...

Coming off a record-setting year, momentum continues to build at the Intercontinental Exchange as it moves into 2007. The ICE has become a leader and successful innovator in the field of exchange-based energy and commodities trading. The Atlanta-based exchange last year carried out a series of signi...

Click fraud is a growing problem for online advertisers who rely on paid search services. Marketing experts are urging e-commerce vendors have to take proactive steps to combat it. Online advertisers pay the search engine company hosting their ad a set amount of money each time a computer user click...

New technological advances, as well as legal and regulatory changes, are tearing down long-standing barriers between industries. Digital voice, data and multimedia content delivery operations are converging with both fixed and wireless telecommunications services. In addition, a host of telecoms, ca...

As more phones and other small-form handheld devices get "smarter," so does the potential for people to use them more often, and for many varied and different purposes. The number of mobile cell phone subscribers worldwide surpassed 1 billion in 2006, and technological innovation continues apace as...

The Intercontinental Exchange, or ICE, has earned a reputation as a leader and successful innovator in the field of exchange-based energy and commodities trading. Having launched a string of new exchange and over-the-counter traded energy derivatives contracts this past year, the ICE's total 2006 f...

The digital lifestyle has taken root in U.S. living rooms, primarily with the TV set and the home PC -- and, like the couch potato, it's beginning to spread. From set-top boxes and time/place shifters such as TiVo and Slingbox to iPod's home stereo and TV component, the shift seems to be centered on...

With ongoing technological and process improvements in the alternative and renewable energy sectors -- and with concerns about energy sources, supplies and environmental degradation increasingly at the forefront of social and political issues -- energy and commodities have become a focal point for b...

For better or worse, 2006 is going to be remembered as the year the U.S. court system should have set up a special turnstile for patent cases; litigation in this usually less-than-sexy body of law seemed to continually challenge once-established points of law. The result? Major case law was establis...

Now that media companies are exploring Web distribution models and using new technologies, a great deal is being discussed about who controls what when it comes to content. Digital rights management has its advocates and detractors, but some type of gateway for the management and monetization of con...

It's taken decades of international cooperation among governments, agencies in the private sector, and a variety of multinational and local organizations, but a multibillion dollar global market has grown up around the issuance, verification and trading of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions...