Former SwapRat shuts doors

Switchouse.com and Big Star Entertainment, a pair of companies that tried to carve out a niche in the online entertainment category have closed their doors. In a message posted on Switchouse.com, which allowed users to swap CDs, DVDs and books with each other over the Net, the company thanked customers for their support and recommended that in the future they do business at Amazon.com's Marketplace. Big Star, which provided information on the entertainment industry, said in its message to customers that it had suspended operations. Switchouse was formerly known as SwapRat, one of the companies that attempted to create an online marketplace for people to trade goods. New York-based Big Star was a public company before being delisted from the Nasdaq last year. --Greg Sandoval, Special to ZDNet News