Club Penguin

Moving to increase its online presence among children, Walt Disney Co. said Wednesday that it was buying the Club Penguin virtual community in a $350-million deal that could eventually be worth as much as $700 million. The purchase gives the Burbank-based media giant an immediate foothold in social networking, a fast-growing business that big media companies have been increasingly drawn to in the wake of News Corp.'s 2005 acquisition of MySpace.com.

Atop the Nickelodeon studios in Burbank is a larger-than-life cavalcade of the cable network's signature animated characters. SpongeBob SquarePants is up there. So is Dora the Explorer, as well as a handful of others. Joining them soon, hope the network's executives, will be Skipper, Kowalski, Rico and Private -- the raucously comic penguins from the DreamWorks Animation film "Madagascar." Thanks to their Viacom Inc.

Continuing to bring in creative talent and properties from the outside, Walt Disney Co. has hired Alex Seropian, a founder of the company behind the hit series Halo, as the creative head for its video game division. In addition, Disney is acquiring Wideload Games, the development studio he runs. The deal comes just a week after Disney agreed to buy Marvel Entertainment Inc. for $4 billion. In 2007 it acquired online virtual world Club Penguin for $350 million. Lane Merrifield, the general manager of Club Penguin, is now working on other online projects for the company.