Ask.com, the search engine company that is owned by InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IACI) has picked up a dictionary, literally. Ask.com bought the properties of Lexico Publishing Group. Lexico owns Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com, and Reference.com. With these, Ask.com’s traffic will now be 145 million unique visitors per month.

Answers.com attempted to buy Lexico properties last year, but the deal did not work out. The deal between Lexico/Answers.com was roughly worth $100 million, but Ask.com left the price of this deal undisclosed. The second most search term on Ask.com was dictionary.

Ask will use their technology to advance functionality on Lexico’s sites. Ask.com will be powering the search on these sites as well. Dictionary is a top key search on Google, Yahoo!, and Live too.

In related news, Barry Diller, CEO at InterActiveCorp has resolved his differences with Liberty Media Corporation. Liberty Media owns 30% of IAC and they wanted to spin off some of IAC’s businesses as single-tier businesses.

IAC/InterActiveCorp owns excite, MyWay, iWon, excite, Evite, Bloglines, Zwinky, insiderpages, CollegeHumor, GarageGames, Vimeo, Busted Tees, gifts.com, Entertainment.com, BagsBuy.com, Shoebuy.com, LendingTree, Match.com, Admission.com, and Ticketmaster.

Information Source:
[1] Associated Press:  Ask.com acquires Dictionary.com, other references by Michael Liedtke

Answers Corporation (NASDAQ:ANSW) announced today that they are filing a universal shelf registration statement with the SEC.  The statement covers $140 million of in the form of common stock, preferred stock, warrants, debt securities, etc.  The intention is to use this funding to help pay for the acquisition of Lexico Publishing Group LLC^[1] (owner of Dictionary.com, Reference.com, Thesaurus.com) and for other acquisitions.

As I’m writing this article, Answers Corporation has been fluctuating between $11.05 (low) and $12.90 (high).  The registration statement was filed, but is not effective yet^[2].

References:
[1] Answers.com Picks Up A Dictionary (.com) Priced at $100 Million
[2] Answers Corporation Files Shelf Registration Statement (Answers.com press release)
[3] paidContent.org: Answers.com Files For $140 Million Raise

Answers Corporation^[1] announced today that they have bought Lexico Publishing Group, LLC for $100 million.  Through the acquisition, Answers.com will attain web properties Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com, and Reference.com.  The amount is fully in cash.  ANSW is profitable company that generated $7 million in revenue last year and has a current market valuation of $101.31 million through shares traded on the NASDAQ:ANSW.

“The acquisition of Lexico is a transformative event for us,” stated Robert S. Rosenschein, Chairman/CEO of Answers Corporation.  “We are excited about applying our experience in monetization to significantly increase Lexico’s 2008 revenues and EBITDA. Lexico’s suite of popular brands, steady direct traffic and loyal users are valuable assets that we believe will reduce our products’ reliance on search engine-driven traffic. Post-transaction, we estimate that over 70% of our total traffic will now be direct from end users or people searching specifically for the term ‘dictionary’ in search engines. Our combined size and available ad inventory should provide greater exposure among online media buyers, which we expect will lead to increased advertising sales.” 

By combining the web properties under the Answers.com brand, this would make Answer’s overall rank #2 in the category of Internet reference behind Wikipedia according to the press release.  Dictionary.com, Reference.com, and Thesaurus.com will join other Answers.com properties FAQFarm (acquired for $2 million in November 2006^[2]) and Blufr^[3]. 

Answers.com was launched in January 2005 and was previously known as GuruNet.  “Answers.com gets a lot of its content from Wikipedia, which they then use to generate advertising revenue. The site features a single search field, displayed prominently at the top of each page. User input is parsed using heuristics, which allows the site to display a selected list of possibly related pages that contain the search term. If the most-available mode is a dictionary entry, for example, Answers.com uses a dictionary data feed to supply the answer,” states Wikipedia’s description of Answers.com^[4]. 

“Likewise, if the most-available entry is a medical term, Answers.com displays its medical data feed, and if the most-available entry is an encyclopedia entry, Answers.com displays commercial encyclopedia data, along with information obtained from Wikipedia in its status as a mirror site,” continues Wikipedia’s description.

I did a search of George Bush on Answers.com and data was aggregated from Who2, Oxford University Press, Answers.com premium partner, Britannica Concise Encyclopedia, Columbia University Press, Houghton Mifflin Company, and Wikipedia.  Perhaps we may start seeing some data aggregated by the 3 new properties that Answers.com acquired shortly. 

References:
[1] Answers.com
[2] Pulse 2.0: Answers.com Acquires Wiki Company, FAQ Farm For $2 Million
[3] Pulse 2.0: Blufr Beta: Don’t Get Bluf’d
[4] Wikipedia.org: Answers.com (Parsing method)

Articulation and rhetoric are two of the business worlds’ strongest tools.  Given that Dictionary.com and Thesaurus.com are free services for everyone to use, I feel that it is my duty to make people aware of its newest products.

1.) Study Guides - Dictionary.com now offers study guides for students preparing for the SAT or other achievement tests.  Some of the study guides include punctuation rules, proper nouns and derivatives, nobility titles, and weights/measures.
2.) The Spanish Word of the Day.  Today’s word is mil which means a thousand.
3.) Word of the Day Flash Widget:

4.) An “On This Day” feed on personalized RSS websites.
5.) A search box for Google Personalized Homepage.