George Isaacson

While bad news around the economy continues to pile up — a plunging stock market, troublesome unemployment, a soft housing market, national debt that's out of control — the e-commerce industry seems unaffected. E-commerce sales are steadily rising and for many cross-channel retailers the channel is a bright spot in an otherwise dark place. This mood was certainly reflected at IRCE, where people were upbeat with where they were at and optimistic about their future.

For the most part, multichannel marketers who don’t operate national retail chains have had it pretty good since the industry beat back North Dakota — and, effectively, the other 49 states — nearly 16 years ago in Quill v. North Dakota. This, of course, was the landmark case that upheld the law that it’s unconstitutional for states to require out-of-state merchants with no physical presence in such states to collect sales, or use, taxes on remotely placed purchases. But earlier this month, the state of New York passed the Internet Sales Tax provision, which requires out-of-state online merchants to collect sales taxes from New