Today, the technology company United Virtualities has escalated the war between marketers, who want to know how their ads effect Web surfers, and consumers, who want to keep information to themselves. The company this morning proclaimed it has developed a new technology to bypass cookie deletions by consumers. The new method, dubbed the "persistent identification element," or PIE, is tagged to a user's browser and, boasts United Virtualities, is nearly indestructible: "PIEs cannot be deleted by any commercially available anti-spyware, mal-ware, or adware removal program."

The U.S. Supreme Court judges heard arguments in the Grokster case Tuesday, giving observers a chance to try to guess the outcome by interpreting the questions asked of the lawyers. But initial reports indicated that the Supreme Court was typically inscrutable Tuesday, showing skepticism about the arguments on both sides.

Two separate Web analytics firms moved in the market on Monday: WebTrends, acquired by NetIQ in 2001, went private, and Urchin Software Corp. was acquired by search engine giant Google. Terms of the Google deal weren't disclosed, but some commentators speculate that the company sold for around $30 million, while it cost investment company Francisco Partners $94 million to take WebTrends private.

What does the lowly 68-year-old copy machine have in common Grokster? Quite a bit, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Like Grokster, a file-sharing service that enables users to download copyrighted movies, the copy machine - which came about after law student Chester Carlson discovered "Xerography" in 1937 - also is capable of being used to violate copyright law.

The quest for new search features continues with the latest news that Yahoo! has launched a beta version of a tool that's designed to search the Web for information that can be shared, edited, and reused. Yahoo! dubs the tool the Yahoo! Search for Creative Commons. It's a useful tool for those who dabble with online content.

The number of people using peer-to-peer systems for sharing music and other files online dropped, as more people download files from iPods and other digital music devices, according to the Pew Internet and American Life Project. Pew reports that while the percentage of Internet users who share files online hasn't changed much in the last year (24 percent), fewer people are using peer-to-peer file sharing. Twenty-one percent of people who download music files say they continue to use peer-to-peer file sharing software compared with 31 percent in February 2004. Use of systems like Apple's iTunes Music Store increased to …

There's more love in Yahoo! land. Just a few weeks ago, the Internet giant gave us a free scoop of ice cream (courtesy of Baskin-Robbins) to celebrate its 10th birthday. True, we never did redeem that scoop (the coupon was valid for one day and well, we didn't get around to B-R), but freebies are good.

One of the ugliest and most twisted chapters in the business of online media ended yesterday with the news that Time Warner agreed to settle a probe pertaining to allegations of improper accounting at its America Online unit for $300 million. The settlement, which came after more than two years of investigation and legal wrangling, pertains to charges that Time Warner overstated online advertising revenues and inflated subscriber numbers. But wait a minute, Time Warner hasn't admitted or denied any wrongdoing.

Our favorite butler, Jeeves, is headed to IAC/InterActive Corp., media mogul Barry Diller's company, according to this morning's news reports. IAC is poised to acquire search service Ask Jeeves for nearly $2 billion in stock. Diller's IAC will likely use Jeeves to drive traffic to its Expedia.com travel site, Match.com dating destination, Citysearch listings and reviews, and Home Shopping Network site. It will also use Jeeves to rack up search-related ads. About 70 percent of Ask Jeeves' revenue is drawn from ads negotiated by Google.

Do you set parameters on your kids' Internet usage? Most parents of teenagers who are online do, according to a new study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project. The Pew study found that 54 percent of parents with online teenagers installed special filtering software to monitor the sites their kids visit, up from 41 percent in 2000. The parents surveyed try to set limits on the time spent online. The study also found that about two-thirds of parents with teenagers online set limits as to how much time their kids should spend online, and about three-fifths of …