In a blog-eat-blog world, bloggers madly try to scoop the competition and be the first to hit their "send" buttons with the latest news. That appears to be the case with the latest rumors surrounding a buyout of business social networking company Plaxo Inc.

VentureBeat on Monday said it was told by a source that Facebook Inc. is "100%" buying Plaxo, only to have rival TechCrunch say that rumors that the deal is done were "false," at least so far. We'll try to stay out of the crossfire, though we will say that initial reports by The New York Times that the company could be sold for around $100 million appear to have underestimated Plaxo's worth. Soon after we published our story on Plaxo Jan. 3, someone claiming to be Plaxo co-founder Rikk Carey said that if the company were to be acquired it would be "for a much larger number" than what was speculated in the Times and that the company was enjoying a "boom time" with release of its Plaxo Pulse social network.

Some reports have Plaxo already receiving a $200 million offer, which could be true if there are multiple bidders for the property. - David Shabelman

See Jan. 14 post from VentureBeat 
See Jan. 14 post from TechCrunch 
See Jan. 3 story from Tech Confidential 
See Jan. 14 post from watchmojo.com