Many businesses now have almost real time data available about their operations. This data can be helpful in contemporaneous prediction ("nowcasting") of various economic indicators. We illustrate how one can use Google search data to nowcast economic metrics of interest, and discuss some of the ramifications for research and policy.

It is now possible to acquire real time information on economic variables of interest from various commercial sources. I illustrate how one can use Google Trends data to measure the state of the macroeconomy in various sectors, and discuss some of the ramifications for research and policy.

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We describe the basic economic theory of pricing a congestible resource such as an FTP server, a router, a Web site, etc. In particular, we examine the implications of "congestion pricing" as a way to encourage efficient use of network resources. We explore the implications of flat pricing and congestion pricing for capacity expansion in centrally planned, competitive, and monopolistic environments. The most common form of Internet pricing is pricing by access, with no usage-sensitive prices. With a fixed set of users, we expect to see greater capacity when usage is not priced, but also greater congestion. However, with greater congestion, congestion-sensitive users might not use the resource.>