So myself and I’m sure many others saw MySpace’s purchase of Photobucket. All this drama was designed to actually make us think that the two sites were at odds when in actuality there was an acquisition in play. I mentioned this possibility in an earlier post (see The drama of MySpace and Photobucket).
It was a smart play by both sides. Throw a little excitement into the mix and it raises the public’s interest in both companies, driving traffic to both, thus throwing in a spike in advertising revenues. It was a simple enough controversy to create (MySpace is blocking Photobucket because they violated the sites terms) and MySpace wisely said nothing, letting the blogosphere debate back and forth creating a whole lot of noise which resulted in buzz for both sites. Looking back at it, ALL acquisitions should work this way. Give the blogosphere a reason to go nuts just before you acquire a company.
