You know you’ve made it when you can start your own foundation! Well the founders of Google who recently joined the billionaires club don’t want to be left out.

They plan to establish a charitable foundation which Larry Page hopes will “make the world a better place.”

Search Engine Watch takes a look at a new meta search engine called ZapMeta.

“ZapMeta offers speedy, relevant results, and some cool visualization features that actually make it easy to check out sponsored listings without leaving your result page.”

As much as we all hate it - there are some suckers out there who are pulling out their credit cards to buy enlarging devices and mini RC cars. According to a recent study by the Direct Marketing Association, U.S. consumers spent a whopping $11.7 billion on products/services advertised in SPAM! That’s 36% of all spending on commercial email!

Despite predictions of its death, email continues to be an effective marketing tool. A recent report by DoubleClick found that during the 2003 holiday season, email campaign delivery rates, open rates and click-through rates all improved. Thats encouraging news for legitimate marketers.

Yet another online record! This time it was Internet retail sales which saw double digit growth in the fourth quarter to the tune of $17.2 billion. The numbers were released in a US federal Department of Commerce report which also estimated that the fastest-growing online retail segments were:

- Computer hardware/software (+38%)
- Consumer electronics (+28%)
- Furniture/appliances (+58%)
- Jewelry/watches (+41%)
- Music/movies/videos (+47%)

Increases in the furniture/appliance category is particularly impressive. You would think the shipping costs of a La-Z-Boy and the desire to try before you buy would prohibit growth. But who am I to say - I bought my Dualit online.

People have been rushing to online movie sites to purchase advance tickets to “The Passion of the Christ“.

Thanks largely in part to Mel Gibson’s movie, sites like Fandango.com saw a 79% spike in traffic this past week. Another sign that e-commerce is for real and here to stay.

Research company eMarketer says U.S. household Internet penetration has surpassed cable TV (67.9% vs. cable’s 65.8%).

- Some are calling it a milestone.
- Some are calling it symbolic.
- The cable industry trys to downplay it - says satellite should have been included. (No Suprise!)

Call it what you want. This is monumental any way you cut it. But will marketers finally wake up and give the Internet some serious consideration?

A Nielsen//NetRatings report released today says that 39% of Americans (114.5 million) used a search engine in January.

Top 5 Search Engines

Google - 39%
Yahoo! Search - 30%
MSN Search - 30%
AOL Search - 15%
Ask Jeeves - 8%

The idea of charging a small fee to send email has recieved alot of attention in recent weeks. Many in the industry believe that a “sender pays” model is the only way to eliminate spam. Among those believers is Microsoft’s Bill Gates who recently, at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland said, “in the long run, the monetary method will be dominant.”

A “monetary method” clearly has big benefits for Mr. Gates and Internet Service Providers worldwide. The costs of handling email are significant to say the least and charging for email would surely add nicely to the bottom line. But the real question is - can a “postage paid” system really eliminate spam? If it can, I will happily pay a couple of cents per email.

- Here are some arguments for and against.
- Philip Raymond from anti-spam company Vanquish has other ideas.

At barely 30 years of age, Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page are the hottest interview in town. ABC got their chance.

Comments from Brin were especially interesting: “I am sometimes something of a lazy person, so when I end up spending a lot of time using something myself - as I did with Google in the earliest of days, I knew it was a big deal.”