Examiner.com buys citizen news site NowPublic
Last Updated: Tuesday, September 1, 2009 | 6:39 PM ET
By Peter Nowak, CBC News
The hyperlocal news market — also known as citizen journalism — is heating up with another acquisition, this time of Vancouver-based NowPublic by Denver-based Examiner.com.
The two companies announced the deal on Tuesday. Examiner.com, a company that provides hyperlocal news and information supplied by semi-amateur contributors in more than 100 U.S. cities, is taking over NowPublic in a deal that is being valued at $25 million US.
NowPublic bills itself as a "next-generation Reuters" wire service that similarly produces hyperlocal news, or content that is centered on the website visitor's geographic location, and operates in more than 160 countries and 6,000 cities.
Examiner.com is backed by The Anschutz Company, a Denver investment business that has holdings in print media, sports teams and energy companies. The companies did not disclose financial terms of the deal but Paidcontent.org, citing unnamed sources, pegged the acquisition at $25 million US. The senior executives of NowPublic will all stay on with prominent roles at Examiner.com, the companies said.
Rick Blair, chief executive officer of Examiner.com, told CBCNews the acquisition was made with an eye toward capturing the huge untapped local advertising market, which has been valued at more than $140 billion US a year. NowPublic's main assets are its global network of contributors and its technology, which allows for the scanning of real-time conversations — sort of like an instantaneous Google search.
"Folks have been chasing this market for years," he said. "If you can see the combination of NowPublic's ability to scan real-time information with the need for real-time local advertising, you can easily put together where we're heading in this space."
For NowPublic, joining with Examiner.com is a chance to go after that local advertising market with significant financial backing.
"We see it as the absolute holy grail for growth on the web, particularly in revenue over the next two years," said founder and chief executive officer Leonard Brody.
Both sites rely on contributions from every-day people who so far have received little monetary compensation. Contributors are usually not journalists, though they are vetted by the websites' staff. Some contribute in hopes of attracting job offers from the media while others do it simply because they want attention.
"One of the key motivations is to have a public voice," says Megan Boler, a professor of media studies at the University of Toronto. "It's not a financial motive. It's a desire that we're seeing across the digital media space to be seen and heard."
Blair said the ultimate plan is to see contributors' pay increase in step with advertising through deals like revenue sharing, which could be based on how much traffic each writer's stories attract.
"As we grow the Examiner's ability to make money will grow. It's mutually beneficial," he said.
Examiner.com has 100 employees, most of whom recruit and vet contributors, while NowPublic has 18.
The deal comes only a few weeks after MSNBC acquired Everyblock, a Chicago-based citizen journalism website, for an undisclosed amount.
