CBS Buys 10-Month Old Celebrity Gossip Blog Dotspotter; Price Around $10 Million
CBS (NYSE: CBS) has bought 10-month-old celebrity gossip blog Dotspotter, for a price of around $10 million. The rumor was first reported on Valleywag, and has also been confirmed to us by sources.
The site, based in San Francisco, was co-founded by CEO Anthony Soohoo, who is a former VP from Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO). Also read this background post from B2.0 on Dotspotter.
The price seems pretty high for a sector which is saturated with more high profile celebrity blogs/sites like TMZ.com, PerezHilton, and others…and, of course, the fact that the site was only launched mid-January this year. But one source close to the situation told us the price is not for the site itself, but the team that has built it…that may also mean there’s a heavy earn-out component, possibly. Would be interesting to see if the site lasts as a standalone brand.
CBS launched a celebrity news site Showbuzz in June last year, but hasn’t really burned the charts. This might be one way of trying to do that. CBS also produces two celebrity tabloid shows The Insider and ET.
Update: The seed investment is less than a million, and as Valleywag pointed out, Facebook CFO Gideon Yu is one of the investors, along with couple of other angels.
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Comments (9)
Oct 11, 2007 10:00 AM
That’s all well and good.. but I prefer FlyLip.com - got the same celeb info but more interactive. Suppose they needed to shop around more befor the made a purchase. For those who don’t know.. http://www.FlyLip.com
Oct 11, 2007 1:50 PM
That DOES sound a little pricy, since celebrity gossip sites are a dime a dozen, and most have identical info. I find my time better spent on a Hollywood industry insider site like filmstew.com. I don’t care who is and isn’t wearing underwear, but I’m fascinated by behind the scenes detail on how the industry really works.
Oct 11, 2007 4:52 PM
That’s quite a sum. I wonder who’s going to make this offer to us.
Oct 12, 2007 9:39 AM
ive worked with anthony. brilliant guy.
Oct 14, 2007 9:29 PM
Celebritypuke.com is worth $20 million!
Nov 4, 2007 6:14 PM
I prefer dotspotters.com ;)
Nov 20, 2007 1:15 PM
I see what you mean - porn on one and celebrities on the other LOL
Feb 17, 2008 4:39 PM
Sounds like a reasonable deal to me. Blog Dotspotter is hot!
Jul 16, 2008 2:51 PM
That is an enormous sum of money for a 10 month blog. Hope for us all perhaps even if we’ve never worked at Yahoo or similar?