Monday, August 13, 2012

After Buying Frommer's - When Will Google Buy The Los Angeles Times?


According to Forbes this morning, 

The publisher John Wiley & Sons  said it has agreed to sell al of its travel assets, including the Frommer’s brand, to Google.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Wiley said proceeds will be redeployed to support its professional, scientific, technical, medical and education businesses.
I’d note that the deal adds to Google’s collection of travel information sites, which already includes the Zagat’s restaurant review service, among other things. Frommer publishes over 300 guidebooks and operates the Frommers.com website.

Forbes later posts that it is clear that Google is now a media company.  
My question then is - with more and more pay walls going up around the larger newspaper sites - when will Google buy a major newspaper?  
And it would have to be a newspaper big enough to have reporters not just around the country - but throughout the world - to feed it's search engine.
My guess is with the LA Times about to come on the market - and with neither the New York Times nor the Washington Post likely to come on the market - Google could easily go after the  LA Times - or the entire Tribune newspaper empire.
Google should in time -  be able to make make far more money linking to the Times than they - or anyone else - would ever make from running the paper - putting Google at a clear advantage over all other buyers.

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