Updated: Publish2 Acq-Hires WiredJournalists.com

Ryan Sholin

Wired Journalists, the social net founded in 2008 by journalists Howard Owens, Ryan Sholin and Zac Echola, is now part of collaborative journalism tools company Publish2. The connector is Sholin (pictured), who joined Publish2 earlier this year, and wanted a way to salvage the potential of a 3,000-plus member social net. Backed by Fuse Capital, Publish2 has the funding WiredJournalists.com never had and the ability to devote some resources to growing and maintaining the network. No terms were disclosed but Publish 2 CEO Scott Karp tells paidContent via e-mail that it was a mix of cash and stock. (We published the original post before Karp answered; this update version includes his responses.)

Owens and Echola stay on as Editors-At-Large, a consultant/advisor role but not as staffers; Owens is on the Publish2 board of advisors. The network remains on Ning at WiredJournalists.com but with Publish2’s editorial standards in place; also, all new members have to be journalists. Publish2 gets the intellectual property, some respected associates, a self-selected set of wired journos to provide/demo its tools to, and a useful domain name given its own interests. Sholin announced the acquisition in a post.

Why buy it? Karp’s reply: “Creating a social network for our journalist community within P2 was always on our roadmap, and WiredJournalists presented an opportunity to buy instead of build. It was a great fit. WiredJournalists grew from nothing to more than 3,000 journalists in 18 months. The front-line Web producers, reporters, and editors using Wired Journalists are exactly the journalists we’re bringing together at Publish2 to collaborate and share links with each other and their readers. With this deal, Publish2 now has the equivalent of 20 percent of all journalists in the U.S. (since launching less than a year ago).”

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