Industry wonk Robert Scoble says the deal is done, tweeting: "My sources confirm that Mashable is being sold to AOL. Trying to get more details now."
If the price is right, the deal makes plenty of sense to us.
AOL is trying to transition from an ISP to a next-generation media company.
It already has 80 or so independently branded blogs and is planning to grow to more than 100.
The problem with the strategy so far, however, has been that AOL's blogs tend to be overly-dependent on traffic from AOL.com -- which is trafficked in large part by AOL's dwindling ISP subscribers.
Mashable -- bigger even than TechCrunch -- is very popular and wouldn't depend a whit on other AOL properties.
But will the deal happen? We asked Ryan about his story and he told us:" No doubt AOL finds them attractive, and it sounds like talks ongoing, but will they close? Hard to say."
Mashable co-editor Ben Parr tells us: "No comment."
See 10 blogs AOL could buy tomorrow →