(FORTUNE Magazine) – Loose Lips Sink Ships: And they sure torpedo stock prices too. That's the lesson being learned by Michael Barach, CEO of the beleaguered vitamin e-tailer Mothernature.com. Barach has become the poster boy for dot-com despair, after a series of candid interviews. In the Industry Standard he revealed that there was a sign on his CFO's door that read, "One: There's no money. And two: Go away." On National Public Radio he described the company's stock price as "almost comic." (Despite a high of $14 last December, the stock had slid to less than $1 by press time.) And in the Boston Globe, Barach characterized Mothernature's gross profit in the fourth quarter as "pathetic." While he thinks his frankness hasn't affected loyal customers, Barach admits it has hurt shareholder value and alienated some of his colleagues, not to mention his staff. But he remains unapologetic, saying he has to be up-front and honest....

Waiting on Washington: There's no decision yet, but Democrats and Republicans may finally be seeing eye to eye on a minimum wage hike: Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert floated a compromise that would increase wages to $6.15 an hour in 50-cent increments over two years. But what was particularly interesting were all the goodies for small business--some $76 billion in tax breaks--tucked into the Speaker's proposal. They include an immediate 100% health insurance premium deductibility for the self-employed; the restoration of a law allowing business sellers to pay capital gains taxes in installments rather than requiring a lump sum; and an extension through 2004 of the Work Opportunity Tax Credit, given to employers that hire certain workers. Now the bad news. Separately, the National Labor Relations Board is making it easier for temps to join unions and earn benefits. The ruling will mostly affect firms that contract temps for longer assignments. Win some, lose some....

Frogger Lives: Before Nintendo and Dreamcast, there was Atari, the videogame system that seeded a generation of couch potatoes. It mesmerized the feathered-hair set with pixilated Asteroids, Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong. Now there's a one-man operation in Kansas City, Mo., that's reviving the great-granddaddy of videogaming. Bill Houlehan's manufacturer's close-out company, O'Shea, snapped up two million game cartridges in 1991, all in mint condition and many direct from Atari. He warehouses the games in a limestone cave and sells them for 80 cents apiece. Why so cheap? To resell them in bulk, says Houlehan, who foresaw the retro revival. "I saw there was a very good market for me," he says modestly. When his cache of a million computer games is depleted, he's still got a thriving business reselling PCs, fax machines, and novelty items like the $3.75 Mr. Potato Head Massager....

Suffering From Dot-Com Fatigue? Well, sister, the folks at the Turning Point Project feel your pain. The new Washington-based nonprofit, created by a coalition of 50 groups, paid for a series of pricey full-page advertisements in the New York Times. The ultimate message to consumers: Shop local, save a mom and pop, save the world. Thanks, Turning Point.

WITH Arlyn Tobias Gajilan, Beth Kwon, Julie Sloane, and Tara Weingarten

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