In this new age of Be Big, Demand Media bought Pluck for $75 million. Demand Media recently allied with Lance Armstrong’s foundation to build out LiveStrong.com, and apparently needed to pick a framework for building out that social media site (and others, of course). Why pick one and invest a few million developing it (or re-writing it) when you can instead buy the company that has been building these things for others?

Why contract for services when you can be a contracting services company? Why bid on domains if you can buy a domain registrar or aftermarket platform instead? Heck, why do anything small if you can do it big?

The answer is because small is able to innovate. Okay, so right now, we’ve got enough innovation to go around and we need execution. Got it. Crystal clear. Exit strategy is other people’s money. But if Pluck couldn’t make it for these past few years as a small, innovative company during the Web 2.0 Exhuberance Era, and we have oh-so-many quality frameworks finally coming out of the hopper, what did Demand Media just buy?

Oh… yeah. O.P.M. (other people’s money). Contracts with USAToday and other old-school media companies, who will now fund the renovation of Pluck as a development company. Got it.

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