Rupert Murdoch, a mega-media mogul, overpaid for an old school media brand already in decline. Meanwhile, he says,
citizen journalism is red hot with Associated Content landing $10 million in financing today from Canaan Partners, and NowPublic pulling in $10.6 million in financing from Rho Ventures on Monday (this time last year, OhMyNews landed $11 million from SoftBank). This ain't small change.
It should be noted that high profile Silicon Valley angel investor Ron Conway (an official advisor to Facebook,) sits on Associated Content's board of directors. Longtime observers of Conway know that if "he's" is sniffing around, there's probably something interesting happening in that particular space. Nevertheless, if you are looking for clues to where media is going by tracking this week's investment patterns, you’re probably in a state of confusion right now.
Here’s a tip: Rupert Murdoch already has a huge global media portfolio and a master plan to match (he’s playing chess), piece meal deals like these citizen journalism investments are built for short term, 4-8 year impact and ROI (they are playing checkers). If your interest is in Internet media, and you don't boast the portfolio of assets of Murdoch, it’s best to keep your media investment forecast window limited to “Internet time” until you’re ready to play in Murdoch’s league.
No comments:
Post a Comment