agents” to deliver customized content to a viewer’s desktop. Smart agent software is capable of learning an Internet user’s preferences and automatically searching out information and distributing the...

agents” to deliver customized content to a viewer’s desktop. Smart agent software is capable of learning an Internet user’s preferences and automatically searching out information and distributing the information to a user’s computer. My Yahoo! and MyExcite are portal services that personalize Web pages. Users can get stock quotes relevant to their portfolios, news about favorite sports teams, local weather, and other personalized information. Users can customize the sections of the service they want delivered. With push technology, pertinent content is delivered to the viewer’s desktop without the user having to do the searching. Cookies, in computer terminology, are small data files that record a user’s Web usage history. If a person looks up a weather report by keying in a zip code into a personalized Web page, the fact that the user visited the Web site and the zip code entered are recorded in the cookie. This is a clue that tells where the person lives (or maybe where he or she may be planning to visit). Web sites can then direct information to that consumer based on information in the cookie. So, someone in College Station, Texas, may receive pop-up ads for restaurants in College Station. Information technology is having a major impact on