Photobucket wants to reclaim a spot at the top of the crowded photo and video sharing space, and it’s prepared to open its wallet to do so.

The Seattle-based company is actively looking at a number of potential acquisition targets, CEO Tom Munro told me in an interview this week. Photobucket is currently turning a profit and is “absolutely serious” about looking at bolt-on buys, he said, noting that the company would likely pay for deals with a mix of cash and stock. “We’re actually looking at a number of acquisition opportunities,” he said. “We’re not looking to acquire companies for user growth; we’re looking to acquire technologies.”

While Photobucket does not have much of a track record as an acquirer, Munro himself has both sell- and buy-side M&A experience. Most recently as CFO of photo software firm Ontela, he oversaw Ontela’s December 2009 acquisition of the Photobucket assets from News Corp.  Munro’s resume also includes time as CFO of software firm Vallent, where he handled several acquisitions before the company’s sale to IBM. He assumed the CEO role for Photobucket in October 2010.

The new focus on M&A is part of a larger strategy to aggressively add more user-friendly applications in the months ahead. Photobucket’s first step in this new direction came Wednesday, with the debut of an Instagram-like app called Snapbucket, which allows users to add filters and effects to photos and share them through social networks.

A lot has changed in the online photo space since Photobucket’s inception in 2003. Facebook is now far and away the Internet’s top photo sharing destination, with more than 2.5 billion photos being added to the site every month. The iPhone with its increasingly awesome camera capabilities has created a gold rush for mobile app developers and led to runaway successes like Instagram.

Meanwhile, Photobucket has had a rocky few years. The company was acquired by media conglomerate News Corp. for 0 million in 2007 , only to be sold off in late 2009 after suffering from highly publicized DNS attacks and reported failures in corporate integration.

Photobucket has spent the better part of 2010 “transforming” itself, Munro told me. “We brought in a new attitude and a new management team, and got the business back to profitability.”

In our interview, Munro made it clear that Photobucket is highly motivated to get back in the game. The ambition will probably come in handy for the company, which has quite a bit of catching up to do. Whether the innovation comes from building new technology or buying it, Photobucket’s big challenge for 2011 is getting up to speed in what is now a very competitive space.

Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):

• A 2011 NewNet Forecast
• A 2011 Mobile Forecast
• Communications, Platforms, Privacy Ruled NewNet in Q4

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Well Mamarua NZ Jewelry all commenced as merely a experiment, really 1 or 2 disjointed thoughts, some scratchy drawings on the odd scrap of paper. I appeared to be always fossicking to find that special tiny something for a friend that had integrity, was NZ jewelry made to gave you that warm mawkish feeling. And every year, there had been a distinct lack of Yuletide decorations that meant something to us, with our devotion to New Zealand-made Pacific design.

I had a creative itch that required scratching and added to that was the allure of being my own boss at Mamarua. I realised I didnt want to contemplate everything I would have liked to do but never really get them done, so with the help of a brilliant young illustrator and a lot of folk directing and supporting my vision, my vague ideas of Mamarua began to turn into fact.

Lovely hand-carved originals were at last finalised, and the process of finding an acceptable molding strategy was in progress. Exceedingly important to us were the materials our fledgling business had to be viable. The chance of recycling something that may instead fill our valuable landfills became something of a compulsion, so after plenty of experimenting we revealed that we could get the required effect with the use of recycled material. Eighteen months later , in October 2007, Mamaruas Souvenirs of the South Pacific were launched.

Inspired by our South Pacific environment, the 1st Mamarua range includes 3 designs Aroha, Koru and Tapa. The 3 NZ jewelry designs are offered as recycled resin mementos and pendants and recycled rubber pendants.

Mamarua to us means two mothers, and thats just what we are : a couple of working mums who have pooled our abilities and resources to point our creative energies in a new direction thats ours alone. Mamaruas kaupapa ( mission ) includes not only planning gorgeous souvenirs paying homage to our Pacific heritage, but also manufacturing them 100% in Aotearoa, using all recycled materials with green packing.

We are very proud that our souvenirs are made in New Zealand and employ eco friendly principles, establishing once more that sustainability can be striking!

Buy mamarua and alternative nz jewellery at Toggle.co.nz

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Contrition is a wonderful thing. Now, I’m not the biggest sci-fi guy here, but even I know that Battlefield: Earth ranks among the worst films ever created—some would even say that it is the single worst movie in the history of cinema. That may well be, but the gentleman who penned the original script has now, on the record, officially apologized to mankind for helping to create the movie. That’s called integrity, folks.

The script was originally written by one J.D. Shapiro, who started work on the project way back in 1994, six years before its unfortunate release. Ten years later, it won the Razzie for Worst Film of the Decade.

The apology begins:

Let me start by apologizing to anyone who went to see Battlefield Earth.

It wasn’t as I intended—promise. No one sets out to make a train wreck. Actually, comparing it to a train wreck isn’t really fair to train wrecks, because people actually want to watch those.

Then it goes into some backstory, but coalasces around this point:

My script was very, VERY different than what ended up on the screen. My screenplay was darker, grittier and had a very compelling story with rich characters. What my screenplay didn’t have was slow motion at every turn, Dutch tilts, campy dialogue, aliens in KISS boots, and everyone wearing Bob Marley wigs.

…

I have no idea why they wanted to go in this new direction, but here’s what I heard from someone in John’s camp: Out of all the books L. Ron wrote, this was the one the church founder wanted most to become a movie. He wrote extensive notes on how the movie should be made.

So there you have it. There’s probably numerous why this movie was doomed from the beginning, but it looks like L. Ron Hubbard, the leader of Scientology, decided to meddle with movie-production.

Leave the movie-making to the movie-makers, and leave all the other stuff to, um, the other people.

Pretty safe to say I’ll never see this movie, not even in an ironic “bad movie night” fashion. No, sir.

We’re not going to report every instance of a famous writer agreeing to distribute via e-book, but someone like Grisham is big enough to indicate a trend that others will follow. I’m not up to date on who is and who isn’t e-book-ready; there are contracts and stuff to be worked out for the majors and I’m guessing best sellers aren’t losing too much sleep over the alleged e-book revolution.

Grisham has spoken out against e-books before, or rather spoken skeptically of them; he is concerned that it will be difficult for smaller authors to get published, but I simply don’t agree with him there. Without the bulk of distribution and publishing houses looking to take a piece, book production can start off in a new direction and maybe even adopt an iTunes model.

No matter how you feel about the Spider-Man franchise going a new direction without Toby Maguire, you have to admit that a 3D Spider-Man movie has at least potential to be awesome. If soaring through the word of Avatar made you sick, just think what web-slinging through the streets of NYC will feel like. Yeah, you’re going to love it — or hate it.

But hopefully the 3D effects doesn’t compensate for a lackluster story line. After all the fact that the film is set to follow Peter Parker through his high-school years leaves already leaves a queasy feeling in a lot nerd’s stomach. I mean, outside of seeing all the films, watching the cartons and reading some random Spider-Man comics, I’m not a Spider-Man expert, but doesn’t that timeline place the film before he’s bit by the radioactive spider while attending NYU?