Online data measurement company comScore released on Tuesday October 2008 e-commerce figures, saying it was the slowest growth it has measured since 2001, when it has started tracking the data. After years of solid growth for online retailers (from double digits to single digits recently), October online retail sales grew at a measly 1%. When online retail growth comes to a screeching halt, with all those heavy discounts and free shipping, something's amiss.

Let's take a look at the last five months in online retail sales growth: 11% to 8% to 6% to 5% to 1%. Yikes. ComScore chairman Gian Fulgoni indicated that rising prices and unemployment rates combined with the psychological impact of the global economic situation has consumers frozen on many of their spending. It will be interesting to see what November's growth figure is like, even with the official start of the holiday shopping season.

ComScore's most significant figure was that spending for households that make below $50,000 per year has dropped off significantly, declining 3% in October compared to the month a year-ago. For households making $50,000 to $100,000, spending increased 1% in October, while households making over $100,000 increased spending to the tune of 14% in October. So, according to comScore, growth really did come to an almost complete stop for households earning less than $100,000. Will spending recover for this demographic for the next month and a half? Doubtful.

Those who cannot drive are going online. Cruising to the mall, if it is 20 or 30 miles away, is no longer a cheap trip. With gas at $4 a gallon, some potential shoppers may not go to the mall at all.

Thank goodness for the internet. More and more people are getting online to buy the things they need. In an economy where many people feel poor, the average online shopper may not be spending big, but he is spending.

According to The New York Times, retailers "are experiencing double-digit sales growth at their shopping Web sites, creating a surprising bright spot during an otherwise gloomy time for sales in brick-and-mortar stores." The paper adds that Gap (NYSE: GPS) "had an 11 percent decline in same-store sales in the first quarter, but a 21 percent increase in online sales."

While the news is a silver lining, it probably does little to save the earnings of large retailers. Internet sales are still a relatively small portion of total revenue for companies that have to support the real estate and personnel costs at significant numbers of large stores. E-commerce traffic may lift numbers a bit, but they do not bring down the expense base that represents most of the problem for retail profitability.

Until the internet sales are 15% or 20% of total sales for a company like Gap, investors should not look at online revenue as a reason to buy retail stocks.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

ChannelAdvisor is an online retailing facilitator, meaning that it fills in the gaps and provides powerful tools that lighten the burden for sellers of larger inventories to place and manage their items for sale. ChannelAdvisor has just bolstered its total received in venture capital to $60 million. CEO Scot Wingo indicates that the intent of this increase in venture capital is to underwrite continued growth. Wingo states that, "Our revenues are growing more than 65% year-over-year so our valuation has reflected that." You may read his insightful commentary regarding the course of retail internet merchandising in this excellent interview on Business 2.0 Beta.

So what has this got to do with eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY)? Quite a lot actually, and the connections are something less than subtle. eBay is a major stakeholder in ChannelAdvisor. You could safely say that the two entities are closely aligned. What poses an odd scenario to me is, wouldn't it appear to the casual observer that eBay is therefore underwriting the success of their closest competitor, especially in light of the fact that ChannelAdvisor is ratcheting the performance of Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) above that of rival eBay? I don't get it. Do you?

What occurs to me is that eBay has a vision for itself that it's just not telling us about yet. Does it see itself basing future operations on a different retailing tier than Amazon? Does it plan to make an overture for Amazon at some point down the road? Or does it see itself and Amazon as co-existing within the retail realm with the expectation that there is enough revenue to go around? The fact of the matter is that this is a very strange internet love triangle, and one that could play out in several different ways. I'm open for theories on what this is, why it is, and where it will go. Please share your opinions, won't you?

Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) got some help from Santa Claus this year.

Fourth quarter net income was $98 million in the fourth quarter, or 23 cents per share, compared with $199 million, or 47 cents, because of an increase in income tax expenses. Revenue rose 34 percent to $3.99 billion, the Seattle-based company said in a statement.

Analysts had expected earnings of 21 cents on sales of $3.77 billion, according to Thomson Financial. Sales rose in after-hours trading. It also gave bullish guidance.

The company said first quarter sales will be between $2.85 billion to $3 billion, below the $3.77 billion analysts had anticipated. Revenue for the year will be $13 billion to $13.7 billion, above the $10.5 billion forecast by Wall Street.

Amazon's results were surprising considering the poor performance at Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE:BKS) and Borders Group Inc. (NYSE:BGP). The company credited Amazon Prime, a program which allows customers to get free two-day shipping for a yearly fee of $75, for helping to drive sales.

Bloomberg News reported that U.S. holiday shoppers spent more money online at Seattle-based Amazon than other retailers, citing data from comScore Networks.

Still, this stock makes investors uneasy. The company has spent lots of money on new initiatives such as Amazon Unbox, an online video download service. Plus, the company has some pretty tough competitors for price-conscious consumers.

That had an impact in the quarter as the company offered deals to help move more digital equipment and popular toys. Gross margins -- always a worry for analysts -- fell to 21.3 percent from 24 percent a year earlier.

Also check out some other earnings reports that we're following, and let us know what you're expecting.