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The shares of online travel agencies Orbitz and Expedia fell on Monday after Expedia dropped American Airlines tickets from its offerings.
Expedia called its weekend action a response to the airline’s new “anti-consumer” and “anti-choice” commercial strategy.
Expedia shares fell 3 percent to $24.32 in midmorning trading while Orbitz shares slid 0.7 percent to $5.55. Get the full story »
Microsoft Corp. said it has resolved a glitch that caused some Hotmail users to temporarily lose all of their e-mails. Get the full story »
Google Inc. and Apple Inc. have stepped up their battle to win over publishers, as the two companies vie to become the dominant distributor of newspapers and magazines for tablet computers and other mobile devices.
Google is trying to drum up publishers’ support for a new Google-operated digital newsstand for users of devices that run its Android software. With the effort, it is chasing Apple, which already sells digital versions of many major magazines and newspapers through its iTunes store. Get the full story »
Orbitz Worldwide Inc. named the former financial chief of Crocs Inc. to the same position at the online-travel company. Russ Hammer, who led the restructuring efforts at shoe maker Crocs, also held a variety of senior executive positions at Motorola Inc.. He replaces Marsha Williams, whose retirement was announced in June. Get the full story »
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announces a new Facebook email messaging system in November. (Justin Sullivan/Getty)
Facebook surpassed Google for the first time as the most visited website in the United States for most of 2010.
The social network site edged out Google.com with 8.9 percent of all U.S. visits between January and November 2010, while Google.com ranked second with about 7.2 percent of all visits, according to online measurement service Experian Hitwise. Get the full story »
Online deal site Groupon is still privately held but retail investors might soon be able to own a piece of it, judging by other startups in which mutual funds run by T. Rowe Price Group have invested. Get the full story »
Maybe it’s all those Justin Bieber fans: Canadians log more time on the Web and social media, including Facebook and YouTube, than any other nation.
The measurement company comScore reported Canada has the highest penetration of Internet access, with around 68 percent of Canadians routinely surfing online, against 62 percent in France and Britain. Close behind is 60 percent of Germans going online and, south of the border, 59 percent of Americans.
The laggards are Italians, where only 36 percent of the population goes online, according to comScore. Get the full story »
The Web may seem like the land of something for nothing. Free video. Free news. Even free tools such as word processing and spreadsheets.
But almost two-thirds of adult Internet users in the U.S. have paid for access to at least one of these intangible items online, according to a new survey from the Pew Internet and American Life Project. Get the full story »
Skype SA says a software glitch caused the Internet calling and messaging service’s major outage last week.
In a blog post Wednesday, chief information officer Lars Rabbe said the 24-hour outage that cut service for millions of users stemmed from a problem in a version of Skype’s software for computers running Microsoft Corp.’s Windows operating system. Get the full story »
Sears said Tuesday morning that it will honor gift cards involved in a computer glitch Sunday night if they have been activated, but had canceled those that were not processed.
On Sunday night, Sears customers got a delayed Christmas present: 50 percent off online gift cards.
Gift cards continue to top the list of most requested presents this holiday season. But what if you don’t like the one you get?
You can shove it in a drawer and let it expire, adding to the $2.5 billion retailers are expected to collect in leftover gift card credit this year. Get the full story »
Animation website Xtranormal, whose cartoon-making tools have spawned viral videos of cuddly puppies debating such topics as quantitative easing in stilted monotones, is no longer offering free, unlimited use of its tools. Get the full story »
Amazon.com Inc. said its third-generation Kindle is the best-selling product in its history, taking the title from the book “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” though the online retail giant didn’t disclose the number of units sold.
The company said that on its peak day, Nov. 29, also known as Cyber Monday, customers ordered more than 13.7 million items, up 44 percent from its peak day a year earlier, when customers ordered more than 9.5 million items. Get the full story »
Internet phone and video service Skype went down in a global service outage on Wednesday, underscoring a weakness of the free online communication tool. Get the full story »
