In an interesting piece of news for video game news sites, Ziff Davis has acquired IGN, 1UP, UGO, and AskMen.com. These were purchased from NewsCorp, Rupert Murdoch’s parent company for tons of subsidiaries like FOX and The New York Post.
Just who is Ziff Davis anyway? Well, the company is actually a subsidiary of j2 Global, who own properties like eFax, eVoice, and Fusemail.
The amount of money that IGN and its sister sites were bought for was not actually disclosed, although Bloomberg stated that it was under $100 million, which was NewsCorp’s original asking price.
“Give me back my 1UP!”
As my source, Joystiq, points out, an interesting tidbit about this acquisition was that Ziff Davis was actually the original owner of Electronic Gaming Monthly and 1UP. When Ziff went under before being revived by j2, it lead to the tragic death of EGM, one of my favorite gaming magazines as a child, as well as a makeover for 1UP. These went to Hearst, then eventually to NewsCorp, and now, including IGN, are back in Ziff Davis’ hands.
IGN and, to a lesser extent, 1UP are both gaming news giants. Hopefully this acquisition will lead to continued success for them. Unfortunately, the lower buying price might be a bad omen. We’ll just have to wait and see.
