Yahoo! Has Acquired MyBlogLog for $10 Million

MyBlogLog, the service that allows you to see who is reading your blog has been officially acquired by Yahoo! Inc. for $10 million according to Forbes. MyBlogLog has found its community-powered services used on the homepage of many blogs. MyBlogLog also monitors reader actions such as what pages that the readers move to next. MyBlogLog.com is based in Orlando, FL.

“This closes the loop between readers and publishers,” stated Bradley Horowitz . “Every publisher wants to know his readers, and the readers want to find out about each other. It’s the power of implicit networking.” Remember Horowitz’s [correction: Bradley Garlinghouse's] ‘Peanut Butter Manifesto Memo?’ MyBlogLog will remain independent, but Yahoo! users would be able to access MyBlogLog with their own accounts and MyBlogLog users would be able to access Flickr and Yahoo! Answers. Over 45,000 blogs use MyBlogLog and 1 million users [correction : 3 million users (see comment by Scott Rafer)] read through these blogs per day.

“The biggest thing in blog search is ego search – my name, the web sites I love,” stated MyBlogLog chairman, Scott Rafer. “People search Google and Wikipedia for information; with blogs, people look for cool things and serendipity.”

Although snagging information from MyBlogLog users would give Yahoo! a competitive advantage for tailoring advertisements to the clients that use MyBlogLog, Horowitz mentioned that this is not their intention. “The thing is growing like a weed in the viral pattern you want,” stated Horowitz. Using reader data for personal gain is not the direction Yahoo! wants to take in the case of MyBlogLog.
[Source: Forbes]