Big Media's love affair with the Internet ebbs and flows with the markets. When they see money pouring into Web startups, they feel threatened and rush to do the same. They ramp up their digital divisions, which usually are no more than venture arms, and hope to strike it rich. When the markets are down, as they are now, their attention drifts elsewhere—exactly at the time when they can pick up innovation on the cheap.
"M&A is gone," the digital media chief at one of the largest media companies tells me. Other than a few targeted acquisitions to fill out business or technology holes, "you look foolish making any purchases," he says, "especially if prices are still going down."
And those prices are way down. Consider, for example, that CBS's entire market capitalization is now only
$2.5 billion, which is not much more than the $2.1 billion its digital division CBS Interactive paid
in cash over the past two years for Cnet (
$1.8 billion) and Last.fm (
$280 million). (It also made a number of other smaller acquisitions and investments). As of December 31, 2008, CBS only had $419 million in cash on its balance sheet.
Launching in beta today is 
