The firm said it made a pre-tax profit of �300,000 for the July to September quarter.

The news will bolster claims that business on the internet is coming of age.

Online advertisers have been one beneficiary of a more stable market - spending on online ads rose by 7% in the UK last year, compared with a 4% fall in advertising revenues overall.

But analysts warn that the market may not have bottomed out yet - blaming the slow rollout of broadband services and third generation mobiles.

Are lastminute's profits a good sign? Is the internet a reliable way of making money?

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Billion dollar sites doing nothing more than Astrology? I'd look more closely at the so-called investment experts that built up the hype in the first place - what great way of losing our investments will they come up with next? Me, I'm sticking to a building society for my savings.
John, Australia

It gives everybody a chance

Sergey Prokofiev, UK

Whatever the dotcom is not, it undoubtedly is a way to set up a fully-fledged business, with not much outlay. Surely we must praise that, since it gives everybody a chance.
Sergey Prokofiev, UK

Companies which provide real services via the net will prosper especially if they link tangibly to the "real" world. I have bought quite a few books on the net from a well known site and they have been priced lower than my local retailer. The service was very quick too considering I live on the other side of the world.
Paul, NZ

The internet bubble was caused by new technology, fuelled by hype and greed, and sustained by fear. E-business will take off eventually. When the dust has settled, and there are enough people with the technical skills to support e-business on a large scale, and organisations feel their networks and data can be secured, and when there are enough people in the general populace who are actually prepared to do business over the internet, then it will happen.
Bob, Australia

A good business is a good business no matter how you portray your shop door. The dotcom bust simply got rid of bad business ideas. Good ideas will always make money.
Mark Rillands, UK

I certainly hope so; and I hope that the gluttony and wasteful spending that accompanied the dot.com era is over, too. I worked for two failed dot.coms in the United States and the rate at which they irresponsibly spent money was staggering. One company had programmers on contract and flew them home every weekend to their families; 1,000 miles away! Another spent half a million dollars on new chairs for its employees. Both routinely employed people who couldn't program their way out of a wet paper bag. Working there was sure fun - I didn't have to ever pay for my meals or do much actual work, since building the "brand" was priority No.1 and very little work was in the "pipeline." On the other hand I'm sorry they're gone; their implosion flooded the IT market with selfish, lazy, self-absorbed talentless people just looking for a quick buck. All you have to do is look at the quality of their work; 10 years ago they'd have gotten the job their skills merited: flipping burgers.
Stacey Turner, UK (ex-US)

Lastminute.com isn't a dotcom thing - it is and always has been a great business idea made possible by talented people and the economics of the Internet. They spotted an opportunity and made it work. The issue isn't whether the dotcom "bust" is over or not, it is whether the business is financially sound using "traditional" business evaluation criteria. Lastminute.com's business clearly is sound and they should be applauded for keeping their heads whilst all around others (including the City!) were losing theirs.
D Miller, UK

What we saw with the dotcom "crash" was exactly what we saw in the car industry 80-90 years ago. It happens with all new industries. Initially you will have 300-400 startups. In the car industry they were guys who built cars in their garages, which eventually whittle down to a couple of companies. We have seen this with pc manufacturers as well. The unfortunate thing is that we also see a reduction in innovation. So now all cars look the same, within a couple of years, all websites will look and feel the same, with people too scared of lawsuits to do anything new
vish, UK

The greed and fear that drove the dot.com 'boom' is now driving the property market

Mark, UK

The dot.com crash is over, and what's left is the smouldering wreckage, and a few sober businesses (mainly the ones that existed before and for whom the new was always just another way to market). But never mind - the heady combination of greed and fear that drove the dot.com 'boom' is now driving the property market instead. Wonder what headlines we'll be reading about that in 5 years time.
Mark, UK

The dotcom crash is not over. I live near San Francisco and see a lot of unemployed dotcommers, sitting over their lattes trying to plot yet another scheme to try and tickle money out of VC's wallets. The internet is a good tool for companies who already have good business models, such as retailers and service companies. However, running a dotcom as an end in itself is a business model that Must Die.
Ann Nanamous, USA

Hindsight is a wonderful thing for all those who now pass judgement on the dot com era. Many people were brave enough to leave their cushy 9 to 5 jobs and work very hard to build a business that may or may not have attracted millions from venture capitalists or the stock market. Where were all the voices of today's critics when the stock market rewarded a few of those businesses even before they had any revenues? Perhaps the critics were still at their desks, quiet and afraid to leave the comfort of their "real" jobs?
Karim, UK

Dotcoms were set up that had no hope of ever turning a profit

David Patrick, UK

Dotcoms were over hyped in the beginning and that led to dotcoms being set up that had no hope of ever turning a profit. The crash sent public opinion too far in the opposite direction. New companies do take time to turn a profit and now that more and more dotcoms are doing so it is past time to stop seeing them as universal failures (just as it was wrong to see them as universal successes before). Dotcoms are just, after all, ordinary companies that just happen to do most of their business on the net.
David Patrick, UK

I agree with a lot of the comments above about realistic business models but I'd also add that "one swallow does not make a summer"!
Dominic Jackson, UK

Businesses should stop placing all their resources into finding ways to make money on the internet and start thinking of ways that internet technology can save them money and help save the environment. The dotcom phenomenon is to blame for companies losing focus and over-spending in technology that eventually led to the IT recession we find ourselves in now. It will still take a good six months or more before confidence is returned to the IT sector and we start to see investment back in technology. The dotcom era is over, it never was - and never will be.
Dave Hampton, UK

I was planning to wallpaper the downstairs toilet with some of my dot.com share certificates

John Haywood, London, UK

I hope so. I was planning to wallpaper the downstairs toilet with some of my dot.com company share certificates - maybe I'll hold on to them now!
John Haywood, London, UK

An internet based company is still just a company. A good product will sell and a poor one won't.
RC Robjohn, UK

The internet is, first and foremost, an information exchange. Plenty of people have suckered investors into trying to climb onto a commercial bandwagon whose long term commercial returns exist more in the imagination than in fact. It's as daft as standing outside a public library and charging people to enter. There are far more reliable and safer ways for investors to make money than by throwing capital at the precarious structure of an e-pipe dream. I wouldn't touch any such venture with a barge pole.
Chris B, England

For every Martha there are five ex-dotcom millionaires flipping burgers

Dan Smith, UK

The internet seemed like a dream to retailers and entrepreneurs but for every Martha there are five ex-dotcom millionaires flipping burgers. I use online retailers and services a lot and this year I will be buying the majority of my Christmas presents online. It is another route to the market but won't replace the high street. Now when the broadband revolution goes past the early adopters then we may see this change.
Dan Smith, UK

The reason that last minute is now making profit is because it had a business focus, whereas most of the dotcoms were nothing more than pipe dreams that were poorly thought out and were always doomed to failure. Any new dotcoms could do no worse than follow last minute' example.
Jason, Manchester, England

I agree with Jason. There are dotcoms making money. But they represent proper businesses which have identified a niche within the market. (See Friendsreunited or lastminute.com.
Martin, UK

The dot bust was over about a year ago. It is pretty difficult for a share to fall much further than 99.9%!
Tom, UK

I hate to put a downer on the story but in the last quarter �10 million more went out of Lastminute than went in. Not exactly what most people would think of as a profit.
T, UK

If you ever find any 100% reliable way of making money, be sure to tell me

Michael, UK

Not all internet companies lose money, but no, the internet is not a reliable way of making money. If you ever do find any 100% reliable way of making money, be sure to tell me.
Michael, UK

The lastminute.com results show that money can be made from web-based businesses providing there's a firm foundation for them. The reason for the dotcom bubble bursting was that too many people who should have known better were pumping money into businesses with no discernable basis for making a profit. Hopefully this won't happen again because those who got burnt last time will be more careful to check out companies before investing in them. To answer the question - yes, the crash is over because it happened a while back. But the recovery is only just starting.
H R Lee, England

The whole dotcom phenomenon is over. The term dotcom is usually used in a derogatory manner when referring to internet companies with a lot of investment but no real business plan. I think it's fair to say that most of these firms are no longer around. Those who have survived should be allowed to shake off the dotcom moniker, as they have proven themselves to offer more than it implies.
Russ, UK