Ask.com closes Dictionary.com deal

Ask.com, the fourth-ranked search engine, has completed its acquisition of Lexico Publishing Group, which owns Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com, and Reference.com.

Ask.com, a wholly owned subsidiary of InterActiveCorp, had announced the all-cash deal in mid-May. Financial terms of the deal, which closed Thursday, were not released. Lexico, a privately held company based in Long Beach, Calif., debuted in 1995 with Dictionary.com.

Altogether, Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com, and Reference.com had more than 28 million unique visitors in March, according to Lexico.

In May, Ask.com said the acquisition would increase its unique monthly users by 11 percent to 145 million.

According to statistics-tracker Hitwise, Ask.com had 4.23 percent of the U.S. search market in May. Microsoft had 5.89 percent, Yahoo had 19.95 percent, and Google overwhelmed them all with 68.29 percent.

[blabtech]

dictionary.com is a good and useful tool, I wonder what ask.com will do with the takeover of the site..?

http://blabtech.blogspot.com

[kregly]

ask.com is a fantastic tool with the cursor on a word and click and get definitions/thesareus context applications. i use it everyday for any word i come across and don't know the meaning it's just a click away.this is a very good thing.when you install ask.com make sure you add the tool bar that pops out also very helpful.

[eccles1214]

I'm happy that Google didn't get a hold of Lexico first. Like Starbucks, there is too much Google and Microsft around. But, then, I'm from their Lexico's hometown. Maybe I'm just rootin' for the home-grown company.

[the15]

kregly - i think you are thinking of answers.com when you are talking about the clicking on words and the toolbar that pops out.
It is called 1-click answers and can be found at http://www.answers.com/main/download_answers_win.jsp