Arguing that "the line between stores and the internet is blurring so much," Macy's has become the first major publicly held retailer to stop reporting its e-commerce stats.

Putting Albertsons back together again won't be as easy as it looks. The grocery chain was split in 2006 between Supervalu and private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management, with both chains using the same logo in different geographic regions. But on January 10, the two owners decided to reunite what will now be a 650-store chain in a complicated deal that leaves only one thing very clear: These money managers aren't thinking about IT when it comes to reassembling the chain.

When chains listen to their customers and create localized store inventory, and then they listen more and accept online returns to any store the shopper chooses, they run into inventory train wrecks.

Best Buy recently removed e-mail support from its web site, a move the company said was designed to improve response and to give customers the kind of interactions they seek. The problem with this change is twofold.

If you're looking for more evidence of the bipolar nature of mobile shoppers, look no further. The Harris Poll people have what you need. In what should be called the NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) effect, some 66 percent of Americans polled said they expect mobile payments to eventually replace payment cards and even cash-but not their cards and cash.

The experience of a Houston-area couple indicates that maddeningly frustrating experiences with online shopping continue, and to the detriment of retailers.

A ring of Canadian thieves who were caught with 30,700 stolen payment-card numbers is providing a view inside the process of tampering with PIN pads - and it's not pretty. On November 9, Toronto police said a five-man gang had tens of thousands of stolen card numbers on PCs and USB thumb-drives, along with at least a dozen stolen POS devices.

So much for the enduring power of big-box brands. On Oct. 31, the owner of Circuit City and CompUSA's brands decided to kill the online remnants of the former chains, redirecting traffic to TigerDirect.com.