Business, Economics and Finance

Former mail order magnate J. Peterman. His text-heavy apparel catalogs spun stories of adventure, and earned him a place as a fictional character on the hit T-V series "Seinfeld." But his business failed, and now he's written an article in the current issue of "The Harvard Business Review" to tell what happened.

Neil Gershenfeld is author of "When Things Start to Think." (Henry Holt) He talks about his research into the future technology. This includes shoes with computers in them, Refrigerators that tell you when the milk is expired, and coffee cups that know how you like your coffee. He co-directs the Things That Think research consortium at the MIT Media Lab in Cambridge, Ma.

Bob Ortega is an investigative journalist for The Wall Street Journal. He's the author of the new book, "In Sam We Trust: The Untold Story of Sam Walton and How Wal-Mart Is Devouring America" (Times Business/Random House). The book looks at how Wal-Mart went from a tiny variety store in backwater Arkansas to one of the world's largest corporations. In doing so, Wal-Mart's business practices have been imitated by other businesses and criticized for its impact on communities, and treatment of workers.

Journalist and urban critic Roberta Brandes Gratz and an expert in downtown revitalization Norman Mintz. The two have collaborated on the new book "Cities: Back from the Edge: New Life for Downtown." (John Wiley & Sons). In the book they look at downtowns throughout the country that have come back to life and examine what revived them. Their recipe for success includes: preserving or introducing trolley traffic, developing farmers' markets, promoting short blocks, keeping government buildings downtown, and insuring citizen involvement in civic life.

Sleep physiologist Martin Moore-Ede. He is founder and president of Circadian Technologies, Inc., which helps shiftworkers cope with night shifts and rotating work schedules. He provides assistance to companies that are open round the clock. Dr. Moore-Ede is a professor at Harvard Medical School, and is the author of the newly published "The Twenty-Four Hour Society: Understanding Human Limits in a World That Never Stops." (Addison Wesley).

Lawyer Sara Horowitz is the executive director of Working Today, an membership organization group for independent workers. Its roster includes independent contractors, the self-employed, freelancers, and part-timers. The group provides services (like health insurance group rates), education, and advocacy. (Working Today is located in New York City, tel: 212-366-6066, e-mail working 1@tiac.net; website: www.WorkingToday.org.

If your New Year's resolutions include getting a better grasp on your personal finances and putting money away for your retirement, you'll want to hear what my guest Mary Rowland has to say. She's written a new book called "A Commonsense Guide to Your 401(K)."

The University of California at Berkeley Professor of Sociology has a new book called "The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home & Home Becomes Work." It's about how work has become the refuge for harried Americans who find the demands at home more difficult than those at work. It's based on her research, interviewing employees for three years at a Fortune 500 company.

Journalist Philip Hilts is a longtime correspondent on health and science policy for The New York Times. He broke the now-famous story of the Brown and Williamson tobacco industry papers, and is the author of "Smokescreen: The Truth Behind the Tobacco Industry Cover-Up." He'll discuss recent developments in the industry: the federal court ruling allowing the FDA to label tobacco a drug, and the historic admission by the Liggett Company that cigarettes are a health hazard and addictive.

Pack Underhill studies what is called retail anthropology, in which he tracks the habits of shoppers in order to learn the best way to convince them to make a purchase. His retail consulting firm, Envirosell, has helped big-name companies such as McDonald's, Levi Strauss, and Blockbuster to study their customers browsing and buying routines.