Shopping Site Offers a Way to Raid a Celebrity’s Closet

For fashionistas in lower tax brackets, reproducing the latest hip look from Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton can mean endless clicking through online retail sites and hit-or-miss searches on Google or shopping engines like Shopping.com.

Now a new search site, Like.com, offers a shortcut for the budget-minded wannabe. The site, rolled out last week, relies on artificial intelligence technology to search images on the Web, and serve up goods for sale that visually match items on a shopper’s wish list.

Visitors to the site search for products in one of two ways. First, they may type in “red strappy shoes” or silver earrings and receive pages filled with images that match the description, along with prices and links to the product pages of the Web sites where the items are sold.

Adapted from: NYTimes

Sunny and Gloomy Signs at a Web Crossroads

Sunny and Gloomy Signs at a Web Crossroads, ROBERT D. HERSHEY Jr., November 19th, 2006, New York Times

So is Yahoo stock, which now trades at $26.91, down 31.3 percent this year, a bargain suitable for value investors? Or is the once highflying company — which in its heyday was regarded not unlike today’s Google — destined to bring further disappointment?

Despite contrasting opinions, analysts and stockholders of Yahoo generally agree on what ails it. And there is a consensus that if it remained an underachiever, it would be a candidate for takeover.

The main problem is that Yahoo has not been nearly as good as Google at reaping profits from the huge volume of search traffic it attracts. Yahoo’s search revenue in the third quarter was $191 million, versus $911 million for Google, Mr. Post’s report estimated.

“Yahoo touches one out of every two people on the Internet every month, which is unparalleled reach,” said Randy Befumo, co-director of research at Legg Mason, which holds some 40 million Yahoo shares in various accounts, including funds run by Bill Miller, Legg Mason’s marquee mutual fund manager. Despite the fact that Yahoo actually has more traffic than Google,” Mr. Befumo said, Google has more revenue. “So there definitely is a problem with Yahoo’s monetization.”

According to Mr. Post, who also points to this issue, each domestic search generates about 4 cents for Yahoo, compared with 11 cents a search at Google.

Adapted from: NYTimes

Big Ideas and No Boundries

Big Ideas and No Boundries, Thomas L. Friedman of the New York Times in his October 6th, 2006 OP ED piece:

• I’ve always believed in free trade, accompanied by better pension and health care safety nets. But I’m not a free trader anymore. I’m now a radical free trader. Why? Because in this new era of globalization, so many people now have the communication and innovation tools to compete, connect and collaborate from anywhere. As a result, business rule No. 1 today is: Whatever can be done will be done by someone, somewhere. The only question is whether it will be done by you or to you. In such a world, the way our society flourishes is by being as educated, open and flexible as possible, so more of our people can do whatever can be done first. It matters that Google was invented here.
• “That society which has the least resistance to the uninterrupted flow of ideas, diversity, concepts and competitive signals wins,” says Nandan Nilekani, C.E.O. of the Indian tech giant Infosys. “And the society that has the efficiencies to translate whatever can be done quickly — from idea to market — also wins.”

Adapted from: NYTimes.com