Egreetings started as Virtual Mall in 1994 and charged people to send digital cards. In November 1998 it made the cards free. The new plan was to pay for them with ads, sponsorships and the gifts people bought on the way out. Its site held more than 5,000 cards with graphics, animation and music. Every card sent was an ad for the service. The San Francisco company went public in December 1999.

Say More, Give More

The pitch on the prospectus was three steps: choose a free greeting, write a personal message, pick a gift and send. Cards sat in channels such as birthdays, so Egreetings could match a gift to the moment. NBC licensed content to the company and bought a stake. So did Gibson Greetings, a paper card maker. When American Greetings agreed to buy Gibson, its rival became Egreetings' largest stockholder.

Ten Dollars to Eighty-Five Cents

Egreetings priced 6 million shares at $10 on December 16, 1999, and listed on Nasdaq as EGRT. Free cards were easy to send and hard to profit from, and the online ad market collapsed in 2000. In February 2001 AmericanGreetings.com made a tender offer for the company at $0.85 a share in cash. The deal closed in March 2001, and Egreetings joined its old competitor.

Cover: Thou Art the Star that Guides Me (valentine), Joseph Addenbrooke. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for an old valentine card.