Social Media

Social networking site Pinterest has raised $100 million from a group of investors led by Japanese online retailing giant Rakuten Inc in a deal that reportedly values the three-year-old U.S. company at $1.5 billion.

Facebook and its underwriters have requested that the more than a dozen shareholder lawsuits over the social-networking giant's IPO be grouped together in Manhattan federal court.

Krishan Agarwal, president of online luxury watch vendor Melrose.com, told a roomful of attentive Internet retailers last week how Facebook had helped his company generate about 25 percent more sales in two years.

Facebook's U.S. user numbers dwindled in May from April and March, according to data compiled by research firm comScore, in the latest sign that growth may be leveling off at the No. 1 social network.

Advertisers are going for Facebook as athletes go for the gold, in the first Olympic Games where marketers are placing such high hopes on social media to create a buzz for their brands.