WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has reversed its long-held opposition to many forms of Internet gambling, removing a big legal obstacle for states that want to sanction online gambling to help fix their budget deficits.

Although the opinion dealt specifically with lottery tickets, it
opened the door for states to allow Internet poker and other forms of
online betting that do not involve sports. Many states are interested in
online gambling as a way to raise tax revenue.

New York has offered an online subscription service since 2005 that
allows state residents to enter a string of Lotto or Mega Millions
drawings.

Free cash on the Internet? No, you don’t need to adjust your spam filter. A growing cadre of consumers are tapping into class-action court settlements reached with manufacturers and service providers on behalf of large groups of consumers who allege they’ve been wronged.

“This is the only legitimate free money on the Internet,” says Scott Hardy, who launched TopClassActions.com in 2008 to connect consumers to class-action lawsuits. Hardy said he has personally received over $4,000 in total settlements from about 30 claims listed on his website.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The founders of the three largest Internet poker companies have been indicted for running illegal gambling operations, federal law enforcement officials said Friday.

The United States Attorney in New York unsealed the indictment against eleven people, including the founders of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker. The charges include bank fraud, money laundering and illegal gambling offenses.

(CNN) — The Federal Communications Commission is set to vote Tuesday on a set of regulations designed to ensure that internet providers grant everyone equal access to the Web.

The “net neutrality” rules, proposed by the Obama administration, would be the government’s biggest foray yet into one of the Web’s fiercest debates.

In announcing the proposed rules earlier this month, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said they would require high-speed internet providers to treat all types of Web content equally.

It has a whiff of buried treasure about it: Somewhere out there are billions of dollars in unclaimed funds just waiting to be unearthed. And part of that money might be yours.

State treasuries and other agencies are holding some $32.8 billion in unclaimed assets, including bank accounts, pensions, savings bonds, CDs, escrow accounts, insurance checks, 401(k) funds and more.

While the question begs to be asked — who on earth would lose track of a CD, escrow account or [deep puzzlement] a 401(k)? — the more valuable point is that the consolidation of online databases has made it simpler for you to search for any loot you may have lost, says Noreen Perrotta, editor of Consumer Reports Money Adviser, which published an article this summer

It’s too early to know exactly how much the Nebraska chapter of the March of Dimes raised this week at its annual Signature Chefs Auction in Omaha, but odds are that more than 10 percent of the charity’s proceeds are going straight to the tax man.

That’s because the March of Dimes went online when it bought about 4,000 T-shirts from a Florida vendor to give to donors during its March for Babies Walk last April. The charity often buys supplies and other materials online, and it also raises money online by selling items at auction — racking up a big tax bill in each case.

WASHINGTON — Buy those Forever stamps now. The cost of mailing a letter is going up again.

Fighting to survive a deepening financial crisis, the Postal Service said Tuesday it wants to increase the price of first-class stamps by 2 cents — to 46 cents — starting in January. Other postage costs would rise as well.

The agency’s persisting problem: ever-declining mail volume as people and businesses shift to the Internet and the declining economy reduces advertising mail.

“The Postal Service faces a serious risk of financial insolvency,” postal vice president Stephen M. Kearney said, an indication that without significant changes a time could come when the agency would be unable to pay its bills.

With a week to go before Christmas, division CEO Raul Vazquez says Walmart.com’s holiday sales are growing two or three times faster than Web sales overall.

At that pace — and with 22 percent growth so far this year — the world’s largest retailer is coming closer to dominating the Web the way it does cities and towns across the U.S. That would mean eventually dethroning online retail leader Amazon.com, whose sales hit $19.17 billion in the 2008 calendar year.

(AP) Internet search leader Google will ease its control over millions of copyright-protected books earmarked for its digital library if a court approves a revised lawsuit settlement that addresses objections of antitrust regulators.

The offer comes two months after the U.S. Justice Department balked at Google’s original agreement with authors and publishers, warning the arrangement could do more harm than good in the emerging market for electronic books.

Google Inc. is hoping to keep the deal alive with a series of new provisions. Among other things, the modified agreement provides more flexibility to offer discounts on electronic books and promises to make it easier for others to resell access to a digital index of books covered in the settlement.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Google said Monday that it plans to pay $750 million in stock for AdMob, a company that provides display advertising technology for mobile Internet sites.

The search giant said the acquisition will help the company’s advertising partners improve how they target mobile Web users, as well as refine advertising formats to get end-users to click on more ads. All of that will ultimately help advertisers to more effectively monetize their mobile ads, said Google.

College students who took advantage of a “deal too sweet to pass up” have run into a bit of trouble.

The $29 electronic version of Windows 7 Home Edition sold for Microsoft (MSFT) through Digital River (DRIV) doesn’t seem to install properly on some 32-bit Vista machines.

Apparently the download files weren’t properly packaged and when some users tried to “unload the box” they got an error that read:

“We are unable to create or save new files in the folder in which this application was downloaded”

A discussion thread with that title was begun on Microsoft Answers’ Windows 7 install forum less than 3 hours after the new operating system launched. By Saturday morning it had generated more than 500 replies and been read nearly 44,000 times.