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According to Dale Carnegie, the best way to make friends is to call people by their names. The personal touch has always been a big hit in business, as well. It's why many customers remain loyal to their "friendly" store, even when the prices are a little higher than the one down the street, where they're treated like strangers ...

One of the ironies of e-commerce is that the most important part of an online transaction occurs not in cyberspace, but at the customer's door. Despite all the discussion about pure-play versus brick-and-mortar, it is steel and rubber -- in the form of vans, trucks and the occasional bicycle -- that ultimately rules ...

Taking the battle for dominance in the slow-growing interactive television market to the next level, the Microsoft Network (MSN) announced that it is offering free WebTV to subscribers just as America Online (AOL) is rolling out its own service in several more test markets ...

Two noted privacy watchdog groups have ended partnerships with Amazon.com over recent changes in the online bookseller's privacy policy ...

America Online (Nasdaq: AOL) said Wednesday it will launch a free portal aimed at helping millions of small businesses get online and use the Web for advertising, selling and gathering information ...

Prediction: It won't be long before marketing consultants start telling startups eager to get into the public eye, "Do something really reckless, really stupid. Stupid enough to get yourselves sued." ...

Underscoring the importance of services in the high-tech world, Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HWP) says it is in talks with PricewaterhouseCoopers to acquire that firm's professional consulting practice ...

Popular culture is a peculiar thing. It's supposed to be a reflection of the current reality -- especially the latest fads and trends -- and yet it sometimes lags far behind. Logistics play a role -- it takes a year to publish a book, longer to make a movie. But we've all seen the ads for TV mini-series based on real-life scandals and tragedies that seem ready to air before the ink is dry on the newspaper reports...

In the latest example of the impact that embattled song-swapping forums such as Napster and MP3.com have had on the music industry, Warner Music Group announced Monday it will release 100 recordings in downloadable format before Christmas ...

Is 25 "old"? It depends. For cars, 25 years brings classic status. For all but the most carefree people, 25 means true adulthood. And for a high-technology super company like Microsoft? Well, surviving and thriving to age 25 is cause for celebration. Take a deep bow, Gates and company. You've earned it ...

CMGI Inc. (Nasdaq: CMGI), one of the first and largest incubators of e-commerce and Internet companies, said Thursday it will reorganize its assets in a bid to encourage each of its holdings to pursue profitability ...

Peapod, Inc. (Nasdaq: PPOD) has announced that it will acquire fellow online grocer Streamline.com's Chicago and Washington, D.C. assets and operations, ending weeks of speculation about the fate of the struggling company ...

It's a slightly chilling e-mail to receive. First, it comes from the legal department of Amazon.com, making it the Internet equivalent of a crisp envelope bearing a law firm's lengthy name. Second, it spells out a change in Amazon's privacy policy that, at first glance, appears to be bad news for consumers and company alike ...

With a decision due as soon as Wednesday in the copyright infringement case pitting Universal Music Group (UMG) against MP3.com (Nasdaq: MPPP), the record label is asking the judge hearing the case to "sting" the file-sharing company with a stiff monetary penalty ...

I'll be brief. Time is precious, after all, which is why everything moves so fast in the digital age. Why we moved from snail mail to e-mail to instant messaging. Instant. The word itself conveys an adrenalized fervor. But maybe it's time to give an old aphorism new meaning: speed kills ...

Scour, Inc. has laid off all but a fraction of its workforce, saying pending lawsuits have scared away investors lined up to fund the file-sharing network ...

Despite growing consumer fears about online privacy, Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) will notify its 23 million customers that it has revised its policy to reflect the fact that customer information may be sold as an asset ...

For a long time, we were told it was coming. Soon we would be gliding across the Internet at warp speed. We'd be downloading crisp video on demand, seamlessly streaming television and radio broadcasts. High-quality teleconferencing would make traveling to business meetings a thing of the past ...

Ask a thousand people on the street to tell you the first person they think of when they hear the name "Madonna," and you're likely to get a pretty overwhelming response in favor of the bump-and-grind pop singer. At least that's the claim of her publicist ...

A dream team of high-tech heavyweights -- led by IBM, Hewlett-Packard, NEC and Intel -- is joining forces to find new ways for the Linux operating system to be used in high-powered corporate networks and on the Internet ...