Economies of Scale is a free, web-based multiplayer business/commerce simulation game under development by Scott Rubyton (aka Ratan Joyce). Players use starting capital to build production/wholesale/retail businesses from the ground up in a basic economic model, competing for market share while collaborating through business-to-business trading of goods and materials. It's more fun than getting an MBA! Also much less expensive. [more inside]
posted by cortex on Apr 3, 2012 - 60 comments

The poor in Ethiopia are often unable to buy newspapers, so they 'rent' papers for 20-30 minutes at a time from local entrepreneurs.
posted by reenum on Apr 20, 2011 - 26 comments

With the crackdown on smoking and higher cigarette taxes in New York City, people who sell individual cigarettes, also known as loosies, are rapidly gaining new customers.
posted by reenum on Apr 5, 2011 - 69 comments

Busted! In one of the biggest counterfeit busts in years, a 19-month investigation reached its climax on Tuesday as federal officials conducted early-morning raids throughout the NY metropolitan area, arresting 29 people, seizing more than $230 million in merchandise and ultimately dismantling three operations believed to have imported more than $700 million in fake products over the last 24 months.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero on Jun 27, 2007 - 147 comments

U.S.Businesses File Four Times More Lawsuits Than Private Citizens [...]The report also found that businesses and their attorneys were 69 percent more likely than individual tort plaintiffs and their attorneys to be sanctioned by federal judges for filing frivolous claims or defenses. The report, Frequent Filers: Corporate Hypocrisy in Accessing the Courts, is available by clicking here. “Corporations think America is too litigious only when they are on the receiving end of a lawsuit,” said Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen. “But when they feel aggrieved, businesses are far more likely to take their beef to court than are consumers.”[...] more
posted by Postroad on Oct 10, 2004 - 19 comments

Half.com expands to list used electronics. The site (owned by EBay) now allows sellers to list used electronics, computers, sporting goods, and trading cards, but receiving a defective or damaged computer will prove to be much harder to rectify with Customer Service than receiving a scratched CD or DVD. Not to mention the postage cost...
posted by nyukid on Apr 25, 2001 - 4 comments

I think they got a bargain. A company which was in financial trouble let a kid come in for two weeks as an intern. He took a look at their business, immediately set up a web site for them to sell their product, and they promptly received an order for 70,000 pounds through that web site. It appears it will save their company.
posted by Steven Den Beste on Dec 28, 2000 - 5 comments

(close-up on my face, quickly zooming out to an overhead shot as I yell) Noooooooooo!!!!! TicketWeb, one of the last places you could buy a ticket to a concert that wasn't Ticketmaster, just got bought out by Ticketmaster. TicketWeb's slogan is "The Online Ticketing Alternative." Not anymore....hello, monopoly anyone?
posted by mathowie on May 30, 2000 - 7 comments