commerce

LONDON--A day might be coming when the power of Facebook means that major companies no longer bother with their own Web sites.

That was the startling if self-promotional possibility sketched out by Stephen Haines, commercial director of Facebook's U.K. operation, while speaking today at the Technology for Marketing and Advertising conference here. Essentially, Haines argued, companies' interactions with their customers could take place so often on Facebook that company Web sites would fall by the wayside.

To bolster his argument, Haines showed statistics comparing how many times Facebook users have clicked a company's "like" button … Read more

The Obama administration has failed in its bid to allow it and other governments to veto future top-level domain names, a proposal before ICANN that raised questions about balancing national sovereignty with the venerable Internet tradition of free expression.

A group of nations rejected (PDF) that part of the U.S. proposal last week, concluding instead that governments can offer nonbinding "advice" about controversial suffixes such as .gay but will not receive actual veto power.

Other portions of the U.S. proposal were adopted, including one specifying that individual governments may file objections to proposed suffixes without paying … Read more

This is a well-thought-out move: Low-cost air carrier Virgin America, which has attempted to court passengers with a tech-savvy offering since its 2007 launch, announced today its initial service from San Francisco and Los Angeles to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. To drum up online chatter, it partnered with Chicago's company of the moment--Groupon.

Groupon users can purchase $77 worth of Virgin America credit for $7 on the massive group-buying site, with the caveat that it can only be used on the airline's new Chicago routes. Given the amount of positive buzz for a brand that can … Read more

Few companies have changed the e-commerce world in the recent past as much as Groupon, a local-deals broker that has gotten the nation hooked on half-price massages, discounted restaurant bills, and packages offering rock-climbing and yoga combos (though, ideally, not at the same time). It's earned rave reviews for customer service, thanks in part to its hiring of underemployed comedians as copywriters and service reps.

Yet Groupon has taken a beating in the past few weeks--not in terms of traffic, and not from the rise of any of its several dozen smaller competitors--but just because of a few bonehead … Read more

The Obama administration is quietly seeking the power for it and other governments to veto future top-level domain names, a move that raises questions about free expression, national sovereignty, and the role of states in shaping the future of the Internet.

At stake is who will have authority over the next wave of suffixes to supplement the venerable .com, .org, and .net. At least 115 proposals are expected this year, including .car, .health, .nyc, .movie, and .web, and the application process could be finalized at a meeting in San Francisco next month.

Some are likely to prove contentious among more … Read more

U.S. online retail spending reached a record-breaking $43.4 billion in the fourth quarter, fueled by strong holiday spending, Comscore reports.

Spending in the fourth quarter was up 11 percent over a year ago, representing the fifth consecutive quarter of positive annual growth and the second quarter of double-digit growth rates in the past year.

In 2010, holiday spending online was bolstered by the first-ever billion-dollar day on record, and others surpassing $900 million. The strong growth rates are a huge swing from two years ago, when fourth-quarter sales fell by 3 percent.

The bulk of online sales occur … Read more

eBay is continuing to press into markets beyond its original model of running an auction house and global garage sale. And I don't mean it's buying more companies with inexplicable connections to commerce, like Skype. Instead, the company is working on highly targeted apps designed to hook new users into the eBay ecosystem.

The first of these is already out: The iPhone app for eBay Fashion. It's a little subset of eBay, focusing on apparel. It has some special sauce, like a "closet" feature that lets you drop images of clothes you're interested in … Read more

High activity during last month's holiday season, as well as continued strong growth from PayPal, meant that e-commerce giant eBay had some rather nice numbers to report in its 2010 fourth-quarter earnings on today. Revenue was up 10 percent year-over-year if you don't count Skype, which eBay spun off late in 2009, and profits were up 24 percent. Analysts were expecting a profit of 47 cents a share; eBay posted 52 cents.

The company reported "strong holiday shopping momentum" as the year drew to a close, propelled in part by its focus on mobile commerce and … Read more

Web sites hawking pirated software and other digital goods are luring in about 53 billion visits each year.

That's according to a report (PDF) released yesterday by MarkMonitor, a company that protects online brands for its corporate customers.

Piracy sites made up the majority of the 53 billion visits, while those selling counterfeit goods such as fake prescription drugs and luxury items accounted for a considerably smaller amount of traffic: about 92 million visits a year.

MarkMonitor identified 43 sites as engaging in digital piracy. Among them, three sites--Rapidshare.com, Megavideo.com, and Megaupload.com--accounted for about 21 billion … Read more