Citizen photography at the San Jose Merc

Interesting promotional banner across the top of today's San Jose Mercury News:

SHARE YOUR NEWS PHOTOS
Video, too -- find our new blog at www.mercurynews.com

This wouldn't by any chance be related to this week's purchase of citizen journalism site Bayosphere (run by former Merc business writer Dan Gillmor) by Backfence, would it?

The "Featured Photos" page at the Merc is co-branded with Buzznet.com. And while I greatly admire the Buzznet folks, this seems like an odd partnership. NowPublic.com, or even Ourmedia, seems like a more logical partner for citizen journalism.