Which Blog Will Be Next To Be Acquired?

PaidContent has been acquired by the UK's Guardian Media Group, reports Kara Swisher of AllThingsD. With Conde Naste hoovering up Ars Technica in May the ranks of independent tech bloggers is thinning out there. And a credit crunch combined with old media's interest in buying into a significant web presence suggests that more tech blogs are likely to be acquired soon.

So who will be next? Well, Duncan Riley of The Inquisitr (and formerly of TechCrunch) thinks TechCrunch is next. Mike Arrington himself has set out a blog roll-up strategy with most commentators expecting that TechCrunch wants to play top carnivore. In fact in April, ValleyWag reported that TechCrunch and VentureBeat were in merger talks though nothing came of it.

ValleyWag itself could be next up with its parent company, Gawker Media, having recently old three blogs in April. The other possible is GigaOm with founder Om Malik suffering from a heart attack in January although both he and GigaOm have now bounced back into excellent form. On anyone's list would be Mashable, with founder Pete Cashmore having recently moved to San Francisco. And finally, Duncan Riley with brand new The Inquisitr. Arrington said he would like to buy him back one day but it is unlikely if that day is any time soon.