News Corp’s Vertical Posturing

News Corp has just acquired Photobucket in a strategic move to monetize its MySpace asset.
My prior writings leading up to this acquisition are below:

* News Corp : Bewildered Pioneer
* Monetize the MySpace Parasites
* Web 3.0 and Photobucket
* Web 3.0 & Photo Sharing : Overview
* Web 3.0 & Photosharing : Synthesis

This acquisition pretty much seals News Corp’s position in the Online Photo Sharing vertical. The only thing it may choose to do further, is to enhance the “Commerce” capabilities around Photo Printing and Personalized Photo Merchandise, which have established large businesses for Kodak Gallery and Shutterfly.

Earlier, Murdoch made an offer to acquire Dow Jones, parent of The Wall Street Journal, to enter the highly lucrative Business and Finance vertical. Today, CNNMoney dominates this category. The WSJ acquisition may be happening. Whether or not, however, it is clear, that News Corp WILL build a position in this vertical. [Our analysis of Web 3.0 and Personal Finance is here.]

News Corp is absent from another category that we have been looking into: Online Travel, as it is absent from other lucrative online segments such as Jobs, Real Estate, etc. It would be interesting to watch which of these are on Murdoch’s radar.