Paid Content reports that BabyCenter, under new prez Tina Sharkey, has bought Palo Alto parenting community Maya's Mom. This is newsworthy for several reasons:

• Shows Tina's decisiveness and strategic skills
• Suggests that the lessons of Weblogs Inc and the network effect were not lost on Tina--or on Judith Meskill, her editorial director
• Proves that deep vertical niches--parenting sites, shopping recommendation communities, etc. are going to be of increasing value as ad-targeting platforms

Rafat says: "MM will stay as a standalone, but the backend social software will be used across BabyCenter's network of sites in 10 countries."