The future is widget-shaped, according to many accounts dispatched from the Shop.org show floor last week. Keynote speaker Donna Hoffman, chancellor's professor of marketing and co-director of the Sloan Center for Internet retailing at the University of California, Riverside, used the podium to talk about the opportunities that Web 3.0 afforded retailers, and called on attendees to find creative ways of harnessing technology to really exploit those opportunities.

My attention was drawn this week to a recent eMarketer study that showed that 11 percent of Americans - mostly 18- to-29-year-olds - were now using mobile phones only. Eleven percent is not a huge proportion overall, but with the trend emanating mostly from this highly influential age group, it will likely increase as others follow, and as the original perpetrators of the trend get older.

Mal Dunn Associates, one the of oldest companies in the direct marketing field, filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Friday. The Brewster, NY,-based company filed in Putnam County Court, NY, and a hearing will be held this Wednesday.

The fact that consumers are increasingly savvy about corporations and their products and services is perhaps more starkly evident in the world of pharma than anywhere else.

This week's feature on consumer companies -in particular, food and beverage producers - embracing corporate social responsibility practices is a timely one.

The marketing industry has come a long way in embracing the fact that clients don't just want pretty and funny ads anymore; they want comprehensive marketing programs that yield business results, as well as brand recognition.

This week's fourth annual PRWeek/Hill & Knowlton Diversity Survey shows an industry that is still palpably struggling with the level of diversity within its ranks.

The confluence of two facts - that the PR industry, as a whole, cares very much about its reputation and that PR is increasingly required to join forces with its sister disciplines in integrated work - led us to take a new tack with this year's Reputation of PR feature.

PRWeek tapped the finest minds in the consumer PR world to identify campaigns from the past 30 years that truly moved the needle. Eleanor Trickett profiles a select few

This week's Agency Excellence Survey, now in its third year, proves an interesting challenge in the area of benchmarking.