E-Trade Takes Manhattan

E-Trade takes Manhattan

E-Trade Group announced the opening of a financial services
super-store in New York City. The company said E-Trade Center is the
first of what are expected to be 20 such locations opening in the next
year. “In the changing market environment, it’s important for
investors to know they have both electronic and physical access to
information, products and services to meet their individual investment
needs,” said Christos Cotsakos, chief executive officer of Menlo
Park, Calif.-based E-Trade (ET). The store, measuring 30,000 square feet
and located near Madison Avenue and 53rd Street, includes a trading area
where active investors can buy and sell securities, a second floor for
clients to get personal service from salespeople, and a third floor with
seminar and workshop rooms, a gift shop, a bookstore, and a cafe.
Earlier this year, the company also announced plans to locate
“E-Trade Zones” within 20 stores operated by retailer Target (TGT).

Microsoft tunes up music streaming

Microsoft (MSFT) has launched a streaming music service it says
offers 1 million online stations. MSN Music (https://music.windowsmedia.msn.com/),
is similar to America Online’s (AOL) Spinner.com and to the online
service run by NetRadio (NETR) online service in offering audio channels
focused on various music genres and niches. MSN Music also has a
recommendation feature, utilizing technology acquired when the company
bought MongoMusic last year. “I would not call (this service)
revolutionary,” Steve Vonder Haar, a Yankee Group analyst, told
CNet News. “But given the relative elegance of its interface and
the scale of MSN’s audience, it will attract an audience.” A music
subscription service, which could allow for music downloads, is in the
future, said Yusuf Mehdi, vice president of MSN.

On a related note, David Bowie will launch his own Internet radio
channel tomorrow, according to the San Jose Mercury News. BowieRadio.com
will offer streaming audio of the artist’s work as well as other
channels of non-Bowie work. “We have developed programming that not
only satisfies the musical tastes and personal requests of our members
but also does not infringe on the rights of the writers and
publishers,” he told the newspaper. BowieRadio will use technology
automating the reporting of performed works to rights organizations.

Airline ticket sites gain market share

Don’t count out one of the standbys of the “old economy” —
airlines — when it comes to e-commerce. Sites operated by air carriers
are growing faster than those of Web-based travel services, according to
a new report from Jupiter Media Metrix (JMXI). Traffic to all travel
sites in February was up 23.5 percent from a year ago, from 24.4 million
to 30.1 million visitors. Visitors to airline sites rose 26.1 percent,
to 10.4 million, while traffic on travel sites increased 7 percent, to
15.4 million. “While online travel agencies made the first
aggressive push, the airline sites have made significant inroads over
the past year,” said Media Metrix President Doug McFarland. The
airlines have “the power of the brand,” Jupiter analyst Heidi
Kim told The New York Times. “They (have) the direct exposure to
the consumer. Once they decided to invest in their online initiatives
and actively promote them, we felt they would gain ground very quickly,
and they have.”

Study at MIT free

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology plans to make materials for
nearly all its courses available on the Internet over the next 10 years.
A Web site for the project, MIT OpenCourseWare (https://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/nr/2001/ocw-facts.html),
will include lecture notes, course outlines, reading lists, and
assignments. MIT The project is expected to provide materials for more
than 2,000 courses across MIT’s entire curriculum, in architecture and
planning, engineering, humanities, arts, social sciences, management,
and science. “We see (this) as source material that will support
education worldwide, including innovations in the process of teaching
and learning itself,” said MIT President Charles M. Vest.

GoTo.com inks new deals with Microsoft,
NBCi

GoTo.com (GOTO) said that NBC Internet (NBCI) will use its search
technology and that Microsoft Corp (MSFT) has renewed an earlier such
agreement. The two-year deal with the NBCi expands GoTo’s presence on
the company’s Web site. Search results deliver by GoTo include listings
for which advertisers have paid. GoTo will also provide search services
for users of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer for another year. Financial
terms of the agreements were not disclosed.

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