NYT is reporting that Penthouse Media Group has just inked a $500M deal to buy social networking company Various, Inc. Various operates a number of networking and dating sites including adultfriendfinder.com and bondage.com, and the far less  triple-x bigchurch.com and SeniorFriendFinder.com. Various was rumoured to be valued at $100M just a few months ago.

Yes, this news is salacious but we’re writing about it for this simple reason: acquisition is still a real exit strategy for startups, but for social networking plays – the buyers aren’t after technology, they’re after audience. In this case it’s a paying audience who’s a perfect target market. Various also has 500K affiliate marketers that bring traffic to the sites.

What Penthouse will do with the Christian dating site is still up in the air.