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Enhance online shopping

As brick-and-mortar stores close, the convenience and competitive pricing available through online shopping are becoming ever more important. This free Firefox add-on provides a simple tool to enhance your online shopping experience.

The buySafe Shopping Advisor installs two small buttons and a search field to your Firefox toolbars. Its searches connect to the buySafe Web site, which searches bonded merchants to provide reliable and safe shopping. This shopping search engine responded well during our tests, returning results quickly. Although it performed well on searches for apparel and shoes, pet items, woodworking tools, and electronics, we didn't have much luck … Read more

Gaming preview: Who should buy the Nintendo DSi and who shouldn't

With estimated unit sales approaching 100 million worldwide, Nintendo has proven itself time and time again as the industry ruler of the portable console market. With the DSi--the second refresh of the Nintendo DS--we're starting to see the company move in an evolutionary direction with its flagship handheld.

The DSi takes with it most of the features the DS Lite had to offer, but adds new multimedia capabilities. The DSi has been on sale in Japan since November 1 of last year and has already sold well over an astonishing 1 million units. Now that Nintendo has announced that the DSi will go on sale April 5 in North America, it certainly leaves everyone asking one big question, "Should I buy one?"

First, let's look at what exactly separates the new DSi from the DS Lite. In terms of actual form-factor, the difference between the two portables is negligible. The DSi is slightly slimmer, but you're not going to see the massive change in size like we saw when Nintendo upgraded the original DS to the DS Lite. What you may notice is that both screens are a quarter of an inch larger. The DSi hardware also actually eliminates the Game Boy Advance slot found on the Lite, so you won't be able to play older Game Boy Advance games or DS titles that make use of the port, such as "Guitar Hero: On Tour." … Read more

Retail e-commerce falls 3 percent in fourth quarter

Retail e-commerce posted its first quarterly decline in at least eight years, during the normally robust fourth-quarter holiday shopping season, according to a report released Thursday by ComScore.

During the fourth quarter, retail e-commerce sales fell by 3 percent to $38 billion, compared with a year ago.

"I thought things would be flat, so this was a little worse than I thought," said Gian Fulgoni, ComScore chairman.

He attributed part of the decline to fewer post-Thanksgiving shopping days in November last year, compared with the same time in the previous year when there was nearly one full additional … Read more

Littlest Pet Shop virtual world about to yip

Awwwwwwwww!

Littlest Pet Shop is going virtual.

Those tiny, plastic creatures with the larger-than-life googly eyes are set to come to life in the virtual world this fall, with manufacturer Hasbro and gaming giant Electronic Arts teaming up to launch the site, the companies said Thursday.

The site, which will be banking on the popularity of the 2-inch idols, will be jumping into a tween market that is already heavily populated with the likes of the Webkinz, Disney's Club Penguin, and start-up Dizzywood.

Once launched, the Littlest Pet Shop site aims to offer preteens the ability to customize their … Read more

Light at the end of the consumer-spending tunnel?

I was paging through the most recent economic report from Piper Jaffray when I came upon the above chart. It graphs the year-to-year change in American household net worth compiled by statisticians at the Federal Reserve. If that chart doesn't make you ill, then wow!

As grim as the picture looks, it's actually a lot worse. Piper explains:

"Americans' personal net worth declined 11% Y/Y from the end of 3Q07 to the end of 3Q08... the largest (year-to-year) decline in 56 years for which the agency has data available."

And we all know how great … Read more

Can we have an economy without spending?

You are familiar with Zen koans like "What is the sound of one hand clapping?". They are designed to open up consciousness with paradoxical or impossible questions. Well here's one: Can we have an economy that is not so dependent on rampant consumer spending?

After 9/11, Bush's solution was to exhort consumers to spend more as the way to propel ourselves out of the downturn. Today we are hearing similar advice.

Problem is, people are saving (or at least not spending, which I don't think is quite the same thing) rather than spending.

According … Read more

Shapeways gives 3D designers a place to sell

3D designers looking to sell their creations have a new place to do so with Shapeways. The site, which launched in July 2008 as part of Royal Philips Electronics' Lifestyle Incubator formerly acted only as a virtual 3D printing service. Designers could use the service to print out a single design, or a large batch without leaving their house.

Now the service does the dirty work of packaging and shipping out what it creates to people who buy designed items. 3D designers simply put together which items they want in their shop, set the prices, then direct potential purchasers there. … Read more

Holiday report: E-commerce dips, electronics plummet

Over the next few days, a picture of holiday sales will begin to materialize.

One of the first reports to surface doesn't sound incredibly painful until specific categories--like electronics--are broken out. And then the hurt becomes obvious.

MasterCard Advisors, a unit of the credit card giant, released on Friday its SpendingPulse analysis of national retail and service sales for the holiday-shopping season.

Overall retail sales year over year (excluding gasoline, which doesn't make a great holiday gift anyway) were down 2 percent in November and down 4 percent from December 1 to 24.

Overall, e-commerce fared relatively well … Read more

Consumers still buying electronics as family gifts

Holiday spending on electronics for family members remains high on the to-do list, according to a survey by IDC and the National Research Network (NRN).

According to results from a survey of more than 3,000 consumers, 62 percent indicated they planned to spend the same amount or more on electronics for family members this holiday.

Those surprising results come as big-box electronics retailers face a challenging time. Best Buy announced a 77 percent drop in earnings and call for employee buyouts earlier this month and Circuit City filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last month.

Nonetheless, consumers are maintaining their … Read more