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CNET Networks, Inc. (Nasdaq:CNET) has acquired Metacritic, Inc. and its popular metacritic.com Web site. By providing weighted "Metascores" and summaries of what the top critics are saying about the latest films, videos, music, games and books, metacritic.com is dedicated to helping consumers make informed decisions about how to spend their entertainment dollars and time. The transaction was not material in terms of financial impact or audience size. Metacritic.com provides access to thousands of reviews across entertainment genres, presenting opinions in a concise, organized and easy-to-understand manner. The proprietary Metascore it assigns to each new release combines all of the individual critics' scores into an overall grade for each item, so users can gauge the critical consensus at a glance. Metacritic.com carefully screens and selects the most respected critics, leveraging the work of a minimum of 40 top critics within each entertainment category it covers. The site encourages users to dig deeper in matters that interest them by reading full reviews when available. Metacritic.com, which is visited by nearly 170,000 unique visitors per month(1), is well regarded among the critics themselves, who view the site as a valuable source of information, providing them a quick glimpse at what their peers think about the latest entertainment releases. Metacritic.com's three well-known founders -- Marc Doyle, Jason Dietz and Julie Doyle Roberts -- enjoy a regular dialogue with the critics, who do not hesitate to contact them when they think an individual score that is assigned to their reviews should be adjusted, and who always enjoy a prompt response by the metacritic.com staff. Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal and winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism said, "I just caught up with a movie I'd missed months ago, during a short vacation, and the first thing I did when I got home was to go to Metacritic to find out how it had been treated -- or mistreated -- by my colleagues. The site is a pleasure to use, not only because it's well organized and graphically attractive, but because it's well-managed and well-written in an unobtrusive way." Roger Ebert, the renowned critic from the Chicago Sun-Times, said, "Metacritic is a quick and useful resource for scanning the response to a movie; the most interesting reviews, I've found, tend to be at the top and bottom of the scale." In addition to supporting the ongoing development of the metacritic.com Web site, which will continue to be run by its founders, CNET Networks plans to integrate relevant metacritic.com content into its games and entertainment properties, including GameSpot and MP3.com, initially. "We continue to build out world class entertainment properties, immersing our users in authentic and unique interactive content experiences. A key part of our strategy is providing easy access to valuable opinions from our own editorial experts, from our passionate users -- and now thanks to metacritic.com -- from the most highly regarded critics in entertainment media," said Vince Broady, senior vice president of CNET Networks' Games & Entertainment division. "Metacritic.com's founders have brilliantly executed on their goal, combining intelligent writing, their innovative scoring system, seamless site navigation and of course their valuable relationships with the critic community. This acquisition is an important win for us." "Our users know how passionate we are about making their pursuit of entertainment easier through innovative use of the most authoritative opinions," said metacritic.com co-founder Julie Doyle Roberts. "CNET Networks is an interactive content pioneer that not only supports our goal and will help us continually enhance our service, but that will also find new ways to leverage our work across their leading brands. This is an exciting step forward for us." Since its launch in 1999, Metacritic.com has received many prestigious industry accolades. The site was listed among the "50 Coolest Web Sites" by Time Magazine in 2004. Entertainment Weekly assigned Metacritic a grade of A in a review, calling it "the Web's best film review site." And an article in BusinessWeek Online called Metacritic "a mathematically precise and well-groomed site that finds the best, smartest reviewers and digests their opinions for you." CNET Networks Games & Entertainment By delivering content and communities focused on games, music and television, CNET Networks' Games & Entertainment properties attract more than 24.4 million(1) passionate consumers each month and help them make meaningful connections with the products, marketers and people that matter. The properties, including GameSpot, MP3.com and TV.com, bring content to life with compelling visual environments and expert original coverage and programming and by engaging users through cutting-edge community features like tracking and personal profile pages that become more robust as users post reviews, ratings and opinions. A universal registration system makes it easy for users to seamlessly access content and features across all three sites. About CNET Networks CNET Networks, Inc. is a worldwide media company and creator of content environments for the interactive age. CNET Networks takes pride in being "a different kind of media company," creating richer, deeper interactive experiences by combining the wisdom and passion of users, marketers and its own expert editors. CNET Networks' leading brands -- such as CNET, GameSpot, MP3.com, Webshots and ZDNet -- focus on the personal technology, entertainment and business technology categories. The company has a strong presence in the US, Asia and Europe. (1)Comscore, June 2005