Many readers know that I have written about my experiences running Internet.Com Venture Funds from 1999 until late 2002. Readers also know that the JP Morgan Private Bank pulled our funding in 2002. The JPM team liked the Internet when it was hot, but did not like it very much when the Net was not. Of course that is why they play with money other than their own. They chickened out and ran to try to make themselves look good with their clients.

Now fast forward to today. What I had predicted back at the beginning of the decade is all coming true. I stated then that large media companies would be spending most of their business development time on buying vertical or specialized Web sites. Go back a few years and think Dow Jones buying MarketWatch.com or The New York Times buying About.com. Or even Jupitermedia buying Mediabistro.com this past July.

And now another small addition to the list. TechTracker.com was just purchased by Cnet a few days ago for a sum believed to be about $15 million. Internet.com Venture Funds was once one of the larger investors in TechTracker. When the JPM team pulled our funding we lost an opportunity to buy more of TechTracker at a discount to our original investment. Then JPM turned around and sold their interest in TechTracker (and several other Internet.com VC portfolio companies) to a buyer of "distressed" assets for pennies on the dollar.

Readers of this blog can figure out the rest. There are more one-time Internet.com VC portfolio companies that are now very profitable and getting ready to be sold. The JPM private client group really knows how to run money!

And so it goes.