AOL to buy Weblogs Inc.

[engine]

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - America Online Inc. has agreed to buy Weblogs Inc., a network of Internet sites focused on niche topics ranging from food to gadgets, for around $25 million, a source familiar with the deal said Wednesday.

AOL to buy Weblogs Inc. [money.cnn.com]

[matimer]

Where's my front page love

My link on the same topic in the supporters area [webmasterworld.com]

[walkman]

so AOL is not for sale to either MS or Google. I mean, at least not being offered sincee everything is for sale

[Xeal_PM]

Matimer: My guess is because that would be two topics for supporters only right on top of eachother. They probably dont want to make it seem like they are forcing people to subscribe.

On topic, I like that weblogs are getting more and more popular and used, but i hope this trend doesn't start to discredit blogs more than they already are.

[Jenstar]

markus007 beat you all, posting it over 12 hours earlier here [webmasterworld.com]

[TomWaits]

Calacanis finally cashs in on the second web gold rush.

[redstorm]

:)Blog, a hot topic in year 2005! AOL is always aggressive to take land from others.

[walkman]

webmasterworld.com I'd say is worth more. This is just of the top of my head of course...

[limitup]

You gotta be joking? LOL

[tictoc]

Like I said before.. I think AOL is gonna be roaring full speed ahead in 2006 and not looking back. Wifi anyone? AOL should be looking into that as well...

Earthlink is setting up Wifi from their dead ISP.. it WILL be a major Wifi, Blog, Search competition for advertising dollars.

Its gonna be a crazy, crazy 2006!

[McMohan]

Wifi anyone?

Shouldn't it be WiMax?

[walkman]

>> You gotta be joking? LOL

I assume you're asking me. If it's all about eyeballs, webmasterworld.com has plenty and I'd say more than weblogs. Now if AOL thinks that weblogs is worth $25 mil, why isn't this one? Webmasters buy a lot of stuff (expensive) too. Not to mention the relatively easy way of generating hundreds, if not thousands, of pages of content a day. Personally, I think AOL overpaid by a lot, but what do I know.

[Marketing Guy]

WebmasterWorld despite being popular is a niche industry and regularly flaunts it's non-advertising policy. A broad network of blogs is much more valuable than a community that would most likely leave if a commercial entity such as AOL (or a lot of other companies) took it over.

WebmasterWorld members may be big spenders, but they ain't likely to sign up to AOL services anytime soon. Weblogs Inc on the other hand have a much more diverse userbase, so in addition to the direct advertising revenue from the network, AOL could stand to dramatically increase the popularity of their product offerings and subsequent market share.

Offhand I can't think of many companies that would pay $25m for WebmasterWorld - there's just a very limited plus selling potential as the USP of the site is it's non-commerical nature and thus it's large membership.

Don't get me wrong - it's not a reflection on the quality of WebmasterWorld - I just don't think that companies will pay for eyeballs only.

MG

[walkman]

off-hand I couln't think of someone who would pay $25 mil for weblogs either, or $5 billion for Broadcast.com, but they did. Maybe AOL wouldn't buy WebmasterWorld, but a huge tech info company would make more than AOL will out of Weblogs.

WebmasterWorld is not commercial in the ad sense, but it's for profit, and it was this way when we signed up. It's not the same as the Wikipedia founder saying: I'm selling it now that you guys wrote the articles.

I doubt that more than 1% of us would leave if ads started to appear; people want the information. Plus, webmasters are people too. In addition to web services we buy procter and gamble products, pizza, socks, soda, and pretty much everything else that humans need.

Brett is probably shaking his head at us debating over the sale of HIS site :)

[bluelook]

Weblogs and WebmasterWorld target two different markets, and that's why we shouldn't try to compare them.
Weblogs target are casual mainstream readers, and WebmasterWorld targets webmasters and markteers. Which is the most profitable? It really is up to the buyer :)