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Technology Stocks : INFOSEEK (GO) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nick who wrote (2604)	3/5/1998
From: emichael	Respond to of 9343

Here's what up. GREAT NEWS> Media companies in the hunt for search engines By Lisa M. Bowman and Margaret Kane, ZDNN March 4, 1998 5:09 PM PST As more search engines expand into the content arena, the battle between media players and Web aggregators could heat up. And soon, traditional media outlets could take an "If you can't beat 'em, join em" approach. At a conference in New York Wednesday morning, CNN Financial News President Lou Dobbs pulled out a phrase from his company's past in describing the upcoming competition between traditional media and the search sites. "Our competitors were the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and MSNBC. Then suddenly, there was something called Yahoo!, and something called Excite and Alta Vista," he said. "Our competitive attention is slowly being focused on the threat of the search engine companies. "You are about to see a battle -- the mother of all battles -- over the direction of the search engine and content companies." Some of that battle could come in the form of consolidation between traditional media companies and search engines, especially as companies such as Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO), Excite Inc. (XCIT), Lycos Inc.(LCOS), and Infoseek Corp. (SEEK) add more content to their Web query features. Analysts began predicting consolidation in the search engine market months ago, saying there's only room for a handful of players. Calm before the storm? But so far, that consolidation has come only in the form of small mergers and partnerships. Just last month, Lycos bought Web community Tripod Inc. for $58 million. In January, Yahoo! bought a minority stake in personal Web page publisher GeoCities Inc. In October, the company bought personalized search engine Four11 for $93 million in stock. Search companies have partnered with industry heavyweights, but there has yet to be a merger with a major content provider. Still, many a buyout is imminent. Today, CMG Information Services Inc. said it's hired an investment firm to sell a third of its 42 percent stake in Lycos. The company is looking to sell the stake to a major media company and has been talking to several of them.