CBS bought CNet and it's big news in the blogosphere. Here are some local reactions to this big media buyout:
Redwood City Startup:
They wanted to be a media company. Now they’ve got a really big media
company to let them know how it’s done. I’m interested to see what kind
of changes come out of this.
Mashable:
This doesn’t come as a complete surprise. CNET has had its share of
troubles, and investors weren’t happy; in fact, recently a consortium
of CNET investors was preparing for a
takeover of CNET’s board of directors.
CNET’s shares have been in the doldrums for quite some time now, and
the shareholders have obviously found a desirable exit in a CBS
acquisition.
SFist:With a fresh banner outside
CNET headquarters proclaiming it as one of the best places to work in the universe, ever--according to
Business Week, anyway--CBS Corporation just made it a little better for the folks who work there. Well, hopefully. CBS decided to
purchase
the "premier destination for tech product reviews, tech news, daily
videos, free downloads, and podcasts" for for $1.8 billion in cash.
Valleywag: There is
little like CNET on the market
— a pure play on professional online content worth $1.8 billion? It
can't be found. But the lack of a direct competitor may have also been
CNET's undoing — the mixed blessing that brought it under attack by
activist investors and led it to CBS's waiting arms.
Sites
like Engadget and Gizmodo (the latter published, like Valleywag, by
Gawker Media) seemed too small to matter when they launched; by the
time CNET got around to trying to compete with the tech blogs, it was
too late. In the meantime, having deluded themselves into thinking they
had conquered tech publishing, CNET managers pursued off-brand
expansions into baby and food sites, areas in which it had no
particular experience or other value to add.
Silicon Valley Watcher:Marketwatch used be called CBS Marketwatch - a joint venture between
Financial Times publisher Pearson and Viacom, the owner of CBS. It was
sold to Dow Jones in January 2005 for $500m. Is this CBS taking another
shot at becoming a strong online publisher? Will it be more successful
this time? It's often difficult to change the culture of a company and
at CBS the culture is strongly based in what used to make a lot of
money for the company: TV.
Sam Spade:This will bring the war that has
been waging over at the 2nd Street headquarters of CNET to an end. A
battle has been raging at CNET over control of the CNET Board of
Directors. Jana Partners, in conjunction with Sandell Asset Management,
Spark Capital, Velocity Interactive Group and ringleader Paul Gardi of
Alex Interactive Media have been trying to wrestle control of the CNET
Board of Directors from the shareholders. The sale to CBS effectively
puts an end to the power grab.
Screenwerk:
[W]hat’s more interesting to me is this traditional media company
buying a “new media” company — although CNET is old new media — as a
quick way to boost its visibility and reach online. CNET is a top 15
Web property according to comScore. CBS also recently acquired LastFM.
(RippleTV is also a potential CBS takeover target.)
The purchases are something of a “hedge” against the decline of traditional media businesses (TV, radio).
TechCrunch:
[W]hy didn’t CNET continue to grow and ultimately take over a media
dinosaur like CBS, instead of the other way around? Perhaps it was
because they did deals like buying Webshots for $70 million and then a
couple of years later selling Webshots for $40 million. Or perhaps it
was because they failed to realize the importance of blogs until 2007.
Whatever the cause, or causes, CNET failed to disrupt the old guard,
and will find itself to be a footnote in Internet history rather than
the headline it should have been.
Good Morning Silicon Valley:
Turns out CBS has been looking at CNET with lust in its heart for a
year, but made a move only in the last couple of months. “We like their
assets,” said CEO Moonves
in an interview not with CNET, but with PaidContent. “We like the
combination of them and CBS, the ability with these premium-branded
sites on both sides to be working together and form this terrific
group. … We have plenty of cash in our balance sheet. … It was the
right opportunity at the right time at the right price.” The
opportunity CBS sees is the chance to quickly boost its online presence
and advertising opportunities with a group of well-trafficked sites
that offer natural platforms for the network’s news, sports and
entertainment content. The acquisition will make CBS one of the 10 most
popular Internet companies in the United States, with a combined 54
million unique users per month, and about 200 million users worldwide,
the companies said. CBS also gets CNET’s international presence — the
China businesses are of particular interest — and an outpost near
Silicon Valley.
TV by the Numbers:
That has to be very good news for Les
Moonves and the older skewing CBS, although 2025 is still a ways away
and many CBS viewers will have passed away in their rocking chairs
watching CSI and 60 Minutes
by then. But indeed by 2025, if I’m still around I’ll be wanting to
roll out of the Del Boca Vista around 3:45pm to catch the early bird
dining special.
All jokes aside, however, I believe the other Steve J. is correct: demographics are destiny.
