Dylan Tweney

RealNetworks announced this week that it’s really, really sorry about its recent invasions of customers’ privacy — and that it’s working with privacy guarantor TRUSTe to implement a five-point privacy plan. The plan includes a third-party audit, appointing a “privacy officer” to RealNetworks’ staff,

From body parts to boyfriends, it seems there’s nothing you can’t find for sale on a Web auction these days. The latest odd lot is a collection of brightly-colored fiberglass cows, erstwhile decorations on the streets of Chicago, and now up on the auction block at Metromix.com. But you better hurry

AOL is being sued under the Americans with Disabilities Act by nine blind people who charge that the online service, as a public accommodation, is not sufficiently accessible to the blind. The AOL client software, they charge, doesn’t work well with the screen-reader programs used by many blind peop

Maybe you’re thinking that online advertising ISN’T QUITE KAPUT, given recent figures that show a steady increase in online ad revenues this year. According to the Internet Advertising Bureau, Net ad revenues added up to nearly a billion dollars in the second quarter of this year; annual ad revenues

Thanks to the Web, now you can put GOVERNMENT DEBT ON YOUR CREDIT CARD. A new Web site from the U.S. Treasury Department (www.savingsbonds.gov) lets you purchase U.S. savings bonds online, paying for the bonds with your credit card. Cool, huh? But still, something strikes me as odd about putting the

TWENEY REPORT UPDATE: I’ve changed the look and feel of my Web site, www.tweney.com, and among other things I’ve added a Weblog. I’m building this log with Blogger, a cool tool that I found out about through Keith Dawson’s fine Tasty Bits from the Technology Front newsletter. I plan to use this webl

A farewell to stores; welcome distributed merchandising, salesA FEW WEEKS AGO, I wrote that online advertising is dead. Now I’m here to tell you that online stores are dead, too.Well, maybe not exactly dead — but, like banner ads, they soon will be, if those who build and operate them don’t wise up.

Link: Video spam, anyone? Broadband may cause annoying side effects Link broken? Try the Wayback Machine.

Link: Mail slot marketing Link broken? Try the Wayback Machine.

Link: Holiday spirit Link broken? Try the Wayback Machine.

Link: Even virtual companies ship real products and have real customers Link broken? Try the Wayback Machine.

If you’re in New York for Fall Internet World this week, don’t miss my presentation, “The Web in 2004: What Won’t Be,” Friday at 10:00am. Find out the real future of the Net’s biggest myths: online advertising, digital Darwinism, broadband speed, and online customer service. Judging by the amount of