InterActiveCorp acquires Ask Jeeves?

The New York Times reports that InterActiveCorp is close to an agreement to purchase Ask Jeeves for about $1.9 million: $1.2 billion in cash and $600 million in stock.

InterActiveCorp owns Citysearch, Expedia, Home Shopping Network, Ticketmaster, Evite, Match.com, and many more companies.

The best way to control search engine placement is to own the search engine.