Q&As

Social networking Web site Xanga.com, and its principals, Marc Ginsburg and John Hiler, will pay a $1 million civil penalty for allegedly violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, the Federal Trade Commission announced yesterday.

Sharper Image Corp. will postpone for five days the release of financial results for its second quarter ended July 31 while it reviews its historical stock option and other accounting practices.

Golden Gate Capital, parent company of cataloger Spiegel Brands Inc., has acquired Carabella Corp. and its Carabella and A.B. Lambdin catalogs.

The Court of Appeals of Virginia has upheld the first conviction under a state law that makes spamming a felony.

The U.S. Postal Service posted a net loss of $268 million for July. When taking into account a $250 million monthly escrow allocation, the net loss was $518 million.

L. William “Bill” McNutt Jr., chairman of the Collin Street Bakery, died Friday at his home in Corsicana, TX of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, according to wire service reports. He was 81.

AirportParkingReservations.com, a Web site that helps guarantee airport parking space for U.S. travelers, has chosen Crossbow Group to develop and manage its paid search effort.

Macy’s breaks its first national ads and a slate of local events as 400 regional department stores convert to the Macy’s name this weekend.

Pokémon USA is riding high with Amtrak and Viz Media under a new sweepstakes that will send a family of four to the Big Apple to tour the company’s headquarters.

In the pressure of today’s business environment to produce quantifiable results, the challenge of measuring marketing effectiveness has been, well, perverted.