Advertiser-side behavioral targeting provider Poindexter Systems named Dr. Andreas Weigend as its chief scientist today. Weigend previously held the same position with Amazon.com, where he developed predictive models for recommendations and cross-selling.

Days after the first arrest for instant-messaging spam, an innovative software product has been launched to help counter the menace of 'spim'

Newspaper publishers, often seen as stodgy and slow-growing, will pay whatever it takes to grab a bigger piece of the fast-growing online advertising market -- if two recent deals are any indication.

It seems spammers are behind the media strategy in Madrid's campaign for the 2012 Olympic Games. That is the ironic result of the International Olympic Committee's serious efforts to clean up one of the most corrupt events in sports--bidding for the right to spend billions of dollars as the host city of a Summer Olympic Games.

The Claria Corporation, a company that has in recent years collected enemies among Internet users and publishers, is ready to play nice.

In an extensive interview, Martin Nisenholtz, newly promoted to the corporate level as SVP-Digital Operations from CEO, New York Times Digital, talks to paidContent Executive Editor Staci D. Kramer about the company's acquisition of About.com, charging for content at NYTimes.com, and the increasing importance of digital media to The New York Times Company. Nisenholtz is now one of only two SVPs at NYTCO -- and one of the 10 most senior level executives.

San Francisco-based Six Apart provides two widely used blogging tools -- a software publishing program, Movable Type, and a hosted service, TypePad, for people who don't want to do the technological grunt work themselves. Boosted by the recent takeover of another blogging service called LiveJournal, Six Apart now has 7 million users, including a substantial number who pay fees that range from $4.95 per month for TypePad's bare-bones package to thousands of dollars for licensing Movable Type to install on their own servers.

Branded entertainment forerunners explain how relationships, technology and permission must support creativity.

Some anti-spyware programs zap comScore's tracking software from its own panel members' PCs, ClickZ has learned. The growing popularity of such programs has increased the churn rate in comScore's online research panel. The same programs likely pose threats to other online research firms' applications.

During the early days of Internet advertising, skeptics often argued that Web ads would never sell prosaic packaged goods effectively.