Online News Sought More for Convenience, Less for Quality

A new installment to an ongoing Pew study on why people seek news online showed that people seem to be growing about as cynical about the value of online news as they had become about news in other media, but... continue reading »

Senate Version of Spyware Bill Resurrected

Two senators have revived their SPY BLOCK bill designed to make illegal many practices associated with spyware, according to ClickZ. The SPY BLOCK bill was an early favorite among online publishers and marketers, as it included an exemption for tracking... continue reading »

DMA Chief: Public Policy Hits Our Bottom Line

Direct Marketing Association leader John Greco told a conference of direct marketers that getting involved with public policy issues is both beneficial and necessary, affecting all of their bottom lines, according to BtoB Online. Typically, the DMA is one of... continue reading »

DMA Lobbying for FTC Spam Enforcement Funds

ClickZ reports that the Direct Marketing Association is lobbying Congress to give more enforcement funding to the Federal Trade Commission to help uphold the Can-Spam Act. Enforcement has been less than zealous, as the vast majority of Can-Spam charges have... continue reading »

IAC Rumors True: Buying Ask Jeeves

The rumors proved true: InterActiveCorp will buy Ask Jeeves for $1.85 billion in stock. The deal values Ask Jeeves shares at $28.24, only a 17 percent premium from their last trading price on Friday. IAC shares, for their part, slumped... continue reading »

Blogspot Site Traffic to Exceed NYT's

Business Blog Consulting points to Alexa figures showing that Blogspot - the homepage for Google's Blogger application - now has more traffic than even that of The New York Times, one of the web's top ten news sites. But a... continue reading »

More and More Marketer Emails Blocked by ISPs

Return Path revealed numbers showing a higher proportion of marketer emails were blocked in 2004 by ISPs looking to block out spam than were blocked in 2003. Two of every eleven marketer emails never made it to user in-boxes, up... continue reading »

AOL Accounting Scandal Earns Another $300 Million Fine, Not Over

The Securities and Exchange Commission whacked AOL and its parent Time Warner with a $300 million civil penalty for materially overstating online advertising revenues, according to ZDNet. In a settlement, Time Warner will pay the fine but not admit to... continue reading »

A Podcast Wins Sponsorship

Podcasting, the newest online media fad, gained a bit of legitimacy with the first known major sponsorship of one of the online blog voice broadcasts. Warner Brothers will pay good money to sponsor the podcast of the Eric Rice Show,... continue reading »

Google Expunges AFP

PaidContent points to a PCWorld story on how Google is granting Agence France Presse's apparent wish to be removed from all Google News listings. A quick search this morning showed only 13,100 "(AFP)" listings, almost all of which were attributions... continue reading »

Gmail Slowly Opening Up to the Uninvited

AdWeek reports, citing a Merrill Lynch report, that Google is now offering Gmail generally to the public, putting up invitations to join to about five percent of homepage visitors. Gmail's free gigabyte of storage has made it both expensive to... continue reading »

Internet Thwarting Price Discrimination, Gray Markets Explode

The price liquidity long promised by the free flow of information on the internet may indeed be coming to fruition, as shown by an e-commerce analysis conducted by News.com. Manufacturers are finding it difficult to exert price discrimination between regions... continue reading »

Congress May Strip FEC of Blog Regulation Abilities

Reacting to comments from Republican members of the Federal Elections Commission that seemed designed to inveigh the threat of regulation among generally liberal bloggers, some in Congress are proposing legislation that would strip the Commission of its ability to do... continue reading »