Small Business Technology

January 6, 2009

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Web Sites

A few months ago I was at a technology conference and things were abuzz. The results of a recent survey had just been announced and—gasp—it found that an ...

November 14, 2008

Entrepreneurs Ask VCs for Cash Back

This week's $250 million funding for vacation home rental listing company HomeAway was the largest Web-related venture capital investment since the bubble days at the ...

October 12, 2008

MySpace Woos Small Business Ads

Justin Esch and Dave Lefkow, founders of gourmet seasonings maker Bacon Salt, went out on an advertising limb. Typically, the Seattle entrepreneurs used MySpace and ...

October 10, 2008

Venture Firms Recoil from Crisis, But Not for Long

Venture firms are sounding the alarm over what this downturn might mean for their portfolio companies. While it's true that great companies are built during downturns,...

October 6, 2008

Printing in 3D Gets Practical

Walter Reed Army Medical Center surgeons who treat soldiers wounded in the war in Iraq have grown accustomed to difficult operations. But some are more delicate than ...

October 6, 2008

3D Imaging Spreads to Fashion and Beyond

No longer just the stuff of Hollywood movies and Silicon Valley video games, 3D technology is changing the way people do business everywhere. Consider Lori Coulter, a ...

October 1, 2008

Again! Tech That Doesn't Work Won't Let Us Work

Yes, I am an angry guy. I yell at other drivers. I roll my eyes when I have to stand in line for more than two minutes. I complain about Wall Street's greedy ...

September 30, 2008

Intuit Taps Hewlett-Packard and Google for Advice

As first-year CEO Brad Smith tries to reshape software maker Intuit for the online age, he has opened his Rolodex and is cribbing ideas from some tech industry icons. ...

August 29, 2008

Making Software Demos Productive

Here are a few things, in no particular order, that this small business owner (and die-hard Phillies fan) would rather do than sit through a software demo: Shave my ...

August 5, 2008

Standing Out in a Sea of Storage Startups

Online storage companies pop up more frequently than mushrooms after a downpour in Southern France. And like the wild-growing fungus, not all of them are easily ...

August 4, 2008

Cloud Computing: Small Companies Take Flight

When hurricanes Katrina and Rita passed over Schumacher Group's multimillion-dollar data center in Louisiana in 2005, Doug Menefee, the company's chief information ...

August 4, 2008

Enter the Cloud with Caution

Managing computer systems distracts attention from your real business. Computers crash, and you fume helplessly as the IT staff restores your ordinary workflow. Just ...

July 24, 2008

Beware the Hype for Software as a Service

Time to dispel a few popular myths. SUVs are not cool. They never were. You Hummer guys were drawing snickers a few years ago. Now, with the price of gas nearing $5 a ...

June 3, 2008

Auctions on eBay: A Dying Breed

Bruce Hershenson, who auctions vintage posters online, is hanging up his eBay gavel. For almost a decade, Hershenson's business epitomized the e-commerce that made ...

April 17, 2008

The Business of Startups Is Business

As far as entrepreneur Dries Buytaert is concerned, a startup with smart ideas and driven people has a good chance of surviving, whatever the economic climate. "Make ...

April 1, 2008

The Apps Small Biz Needs Now

Why doesn't someone invent clothing with very small, powerful magnetic material woven in? That way all the clothes teenagers leave strewn about the house could be ...

March 5, 2008

Tech Trends to Ignore

As I grow older, it seems like I get ignored more often. Much more. My wife, who used to be so attentive to my needs, barely listens to half of what I say. My kids, ...

February 21, 2008

When Good Isn't Good Enough

In a flat world where, as Thomas Friedman points out, globalization has leveled the competitive field, a new idea can have dozens of competitors worldwide within ...

February 5, 2008

Worthwhile Small Business Technologies

There are things in life that just work as promised. Refrigerators. Clock radios. Flattery. Children's Motrin. FEMA. Velcro. Blue jeans. Big Macs. Seinfeld. Jack ...

January 4, 2008

Tech 'Solutions' Your Small Biz Can't Use

I've used a lot of things that don't work as advertised. Maybe it's me or maybe it's bad luck. Or maybe it's just bad stuff. I've never had any success with vitamins; ...

December 18, 2007

Validus: A New Power Player

In the 1880s, power industry pioneers Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse Jr. engaged in a fierce public debate dubbed the "war of currents" about whether ...

November 21, 2007

Ten Penny-Pinching Ideas for 2008

The year is drawing to a close and I can happily say that I've learned a few things in 2007. I've learned how safe the world is because Microsoft (MSFT) does not build...

November 5, 2007

Beckoning Boomers to the Web

In the summer of 2006 my inbox was flooded with pitches from new Web companies hoping to bring some of the MySpace (NWS) magic to the largest and most neglected ...

October 24, 2007

EBay: The Place for Microfinance

Tracey Pettengill Turner doesn't want to give handouts to poor people. But she does want to make investments in them. So on Oct. 24, Turner is launching ...

September 25, 2007

Goosing Google Search Rankings

Jena Houman has a question that's surely of interest to many business owners hoping to generate sales via the Web: My husband and I have owned a natural stone business...