Stories by: Meghan Holohan

DEFINITION: Application service providers offer an outsourcing mechanism whereby they develop, supply and manage application software and hardware for their customers, thus freeing up customers' internal IT resources. Meghan Holohan Organisations use computers to run applications that carry out specific business functions. Typically, organisations spend a serious amount of money to buy software. (Technically, of course, they don't actually buy programs but rather licences to use them.) Whether it's a PC application that an information technology department has to supply to thousands of users, or a mainframe or server-based program of which it only needs a few copies, the overall cost is still very high - sometimes cripplingly high. And that's just the beginning.

Microsoft today announced the availability of its cookie management feature for Internet Explorer 5.5. The feature gives users the options of deleting cookies as an added form of privacy.

The California state Senate Wednesday passed a bill that, if approved by the state Assembly and signed by the governor, will require all California-based companies to add sales tax to online purchases.

Layoffs could be the remedy for the ailing Drkoop.com Inc.'s financial health problems.

It will look like any other digital sign. Every minute or so, the message will change. It might flash, "Bananas on sale," because it knows that there are too many bananas in the stockroom.

Citing low traffic and a plan to emphasize its real estate and automotive Web sites, Auction.com, one of many online auction sites, will close Aug. 31.

The Democratic National Committee's http://www.dems2000.com/ Web site significantly outperformed the Republican National Committee's site, gopconvention.com during the respective conventions, according to a consulting firm report.

) More than three-quarters (82%) of employees in the electronics industry said their supervisors would "never authorize unethical or illegal conduct to meet a business goal," according to a recent survey of technology industry professionals by KPMG Consulting LLC in McLean, Va.

Christoph Sensen, head of the National Research Council of Canada's (NRC) Bioinformatics Group, had a problem. He had to connect 800 scientists to more than 100 databases and about 1,000 applications to make the country's bioinformatics project work.

According to the results of a study released on Wednesday by the UCLA Center for Communication Policy, many of the Internet users surveyed said the Internet is a more important source of information than either radio or television.

In a sign of the times for e-commerce ventures struggling to become profitable, Amazon.com last week disclosed that financial agreements with some other online retailers in which it has invested are being restructured after the companies asked for changes such as reductions in the cash payments they make to Amazon.