CONFIRMED: MySpace Acquires Photobucket

Confirmed

It's been confirmed.  MySpace has indeed acquired Photobucket, giving them the $300 million price tag range they've been valued at.  Someone at Photobucket is getting a bonus today.

Why Is This News?

After all the bad blood between the two companies, they're now part of the same family.  That's partially what makes this acquisition so surprising: MySpace recently cut off Photobucet, rendering their video widgets useless on the biggest social network.  After talks regarding the regulations of MySpace widgets, Photobucket videos were allowed to come back.  And now Photobucket is "back" in a big way. 

While it's common for some larger companies to buy their competition outright, MySpace has always been rather strict when it comes to parasite companies that get too big.  This was seemingly the case with Photobucket, whose photo widgets were not removed during the brief Photobucket video ban, causing some to speculate a conspiracy on the part of MySpace. 

What it Means for Web Companies

So what does this mean for MySpace, Photobucket, and the rest of the world?  They've not got a built in widget system for media sharing, that offers more variety than what they've got in house.  That's always been key for MySpace users, as they crave variety and personalization.  It also means that hundreds of parasite companies are now more hopeful than ever that they'll get acquired by the MySpace machine, instead of shut off. 

Other MySpace acquisitions include Newroo, which became MySpace News.

In other Photobucket news, they are now supported by Snap, the website preview service.  Photobucket users' account images can now be viewed using Snap, enabling them to see images without navigating away from the current site.  via

Image from Mashable.com

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