TechCrunch to Sell to CNET for $100+ Million?
Analyst Doug McIntyre at 24/7 Wall St doesn't have specific thoughts on the valuation, but he makes a persuasive case about why TechCrunch and other big blogs will eventually be bought for big numbers by big media.
Context & Ripple Effects
Silicon Alley Insider floats a rumored TechCrunch–CNET deal above $100 million — unconfirmed on either side — and leans on 24/7 Wall St.'s Doug McIntyre to argue the why: big blogs have become assets big media must eventually own. The pickup traveled fast, with BoomTown, 7 Wall St. asking 'Who Will Buy The Big Blogs?', and TechCrunch itself responding, swiping at Blodget's Google call in the same post.
Timing gives the rumor weight: TechCrunch had just staged TechCrunch40 with a $50,000 launch prize and live-blogged every session, then hired Business 2.0's Erick Schonfeld as co-editor — a property operating like a media company rather than a lone blog. CNET, meanwhile, spent June 2007 defending its continued coverage of payola allegations against FM authors long after the rest of the blogosphere moved on, making its appetite for blog-world credibility the open question.
First-order effects
- For CNET, a deal would buy an audience and a working conference franchise (TechCrunch40) outright instead of building one — directly relevant for a brand still fending off payola-coverage criticism from bloggers.
- For TechCrunch, the rumor sets a public price anchor north of $100M days after the Schonfeld hire, so scaling the masthead reads either as preparing for a sale or as bargaining leverage.
Second-order effects
- Rival big-media owners are forced to price independent blogs as M&A assets: with McIntyre's thesis echoed by BoomTown and 7 Wall St., the few properties combining audience plus an event franchise — TechCrunch, and per the syndicated framing, Huffington — become a contested, scarce pool.
- Blog founders gain negotiating power they never had under pure ad-revenue math, since buyers are bidding for strategic positioning against Google-era traffic shifts rather than for cash flow alone.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, independent tech media consolidates into legacy portals, and the binding constraint shifts from traffic to retaining founder-led brands and their event franchises after acquisition.
- Valuation language detaches from revenue multiples toward strategic scarcity — the same dynamic McIntyre flags when he argues big numbers, not editorial merit, will decide who owns the big blogs.
The trend: Big media is shifting from building web audiences organically to buying independent blogs outright, with conference-and-audience scale setting the price.