While much of the attention was on Yahoo!, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) today, there was actually some good news for other Net stocks. Take Monster Worldwide (NASDAQ: MNST).

For its Q4, Monster reported a 15% increase in net income to $45 million, or $0.36 cents per share. Oh, and revenues spiked 59% to $354 million.

True, the North American market was weak (especially in the financial services space because of the subprime meltdown). However, Monster is seeing lots of traction in foreign markets, such as in Europe, India and South Korea.

If I had $61 million in cash, I think I could do much better with it than Monster Worldwide (NASDAQ: MNST). That's how much the company shelled out for Affinity Labs, which got its start last year.

In fact, the company says it is in the "development stage" and has about one million registered users. So yes, I guess Monster is expecting a monstrous number of job listings to come from this deal (at least I hope so).

OK, what is Affinity all about? Basically, it's a network of sites that cater to certain professions and vocations, such as PoliceLink, FireLink, GovCentral, and so on.

True, these sites have social networking features, such as profiles, photo sharing, and videos. Yet, the technology seems fairly generic.

But keep in mind that the founder of Affinity, Christopher Michel, sold Military.com to Monster.com back in 2004. That site is a thriving community with more than 10 million members.

So perhaps Monster is trying to snag Michel to get his social networking credentials. But, it sure does look like a hefty price tag.

In yesterday's trading, Monster.com's stock was down 4% to $27.73.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.