Will Digg-News Corp. deal include Revision3? [Rumormonger]
Though the timing of Digg's deal with the Wall Street Journal was coincidental, we're told, it has sparked a new wave of whispers that News Corp. might be taking another look at the headline-voting site.
Context & Ripple Effects
Digg's profile as an acquisition target has been building since its traffic rivalry with legacy news outlets — a 2006 Hitwise reality check pitted it directly against the New York Times. What changed this week is concrete: Digg has struck a deal with the Wall Street Journal (confirmed), and per Valleywag the timing relative to fresh takeover whispers was coincidental — which has only fueled them.
The unconfirmed layer is doing the work here: sources whisper that News Corp. may be taking another look at the headline-voting site, and that any deal could sweep in Revision3, the video venture tied to Digg's leadership. No syndicated pickup or public reaction is recorded, so this remains a single-outlet whisper rather than a market consensus.
First-order effects
- Digg re-enters News Corp.'s acquisition conversation without lifting a finger — the confirmed Wall Street Journal deal hands it a working relationship inside the rumored buyer's orbit and fresh negotiating visibility.
- Revision3's fate gets coupled to Digg's: any suitor weighing the voting site must now also price the video property the whispers bundle with it.
Second-order effects
- If News Corp. or another legacy media bidder engages, valuation talks shift from a single site to a portfolio question — whether community-voted news plus founder-linked video is worth more together than apart, and whether rival bidders must bid for both to win either.
Third-order effects
- The pattern points toward late-2000s social-news properties being valued as bolt-on community layers for traditional media owners rather than standalone businesses — a structural test of whether vote-driven aggregation survives inside a conglomerate.
The trend: Legacy media consolidators are circling user-voted news startups, with deal scope expanding from single sites to founder-linked portfolios.