Posted on 11/21/2009 8:22:46 PM PST by bruinbirdman
AOL and Time Warner have finally called it quits. James Quinn looks at the souring of the dotcom match that appeared to have been made in mergers and acquisitions heaven
It was an auspicious occasion, the business titans of the West standing shoulder to shoulder at the dawn of a new century. On the stage of the Shanghai International Convention Centre, in late September 1999, the crème de la crème of business achievement smiled at the hundreds of delegates, both Chinese and from around the world, who had gathered for the Fortune Global Forum.
From AIG's Hank Greenberg to Viacom's Sumner Redstone, from Yahoo!'s Jerry Yang to General Electric's Jack Welch, the three-day gathering was a veritable who's who of corporate America.
Among the high-powered throng were two other men, perhaps less well known to the crowd. Gerald "Jerry" Levin, chairman of Time Warner, the media giant which had been formed 10 years earlier from the $14bn (£8.4bn) combination of Time Inc and Warner Communications; and Steve Case, chairman of AOL, the dotcom darling which had effortlessly swallowed Netscape for $4.2bn just months earlier.
It was at this rather grand gathering that the first seed was sown. Case pulled Merv Adelson, a long-time Time Warner board member, to one side, and asked him whether Time Warner's board had thought about merging with AOL. Adelson went straight to Levin, who shrugged and initially dismissed the suggestion. But within three months – after a series of clandestine meetings in New York and Boston and a dinner at Case's home – the two men announced the $360bn combination of AOL Time Warner on January 10 2000.
One of the world's biggest media content companies was to merge with one of the largest distributors of internet content – a
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
I remember when AOL was charging 24.95/month for dialup when all the upstarts were charging 10.00/month, and the cheap service was just as fast and reliable, in my experience.
Good riddance .
I am looking forward to seeing the unemployed hard core leftists that formerly worked at AOL News ( aka Obaam AOL News ) !
AOL still charges $24.95 a month for dialup.
AOL was one of the shiite=itist companies every invented. I can remember being on the phone with AOL customer service about their crummy service and got a call on my other line from their sales about getting an account. I quite literally put them together on a conference to explain to me how they could be signing up more clients in my area when the servers were completely overloaded.
I have a couple of clients that have AOL.
They won’t leave due to fear and stupidity - and they believe they need to keep their AOL email address... which is probably going away soon anyway.
I’ve never used AOL, even back in the late 1990s when they were popular. I always used a local dial-up.
i once decided to keep every AOL promotional sign-up CD that came my way; through the mail, at computer store check-outs, at booths, etc. I never passed an opportunity. Before I tossed them, I had close to 50. Them things was ubiquitous!
It is amazing, isn't it? Few things in life say "I'm just stupid" more than "@aol.com". With the notable exception, of course, of "I'm a Democrat".
Every company was better than AOL for connecting to the internet.
I predicted that this merger would suck and I was proven right within 2 years. Its been dragging on since then.
I got at least six months free out of them. They used to give out those free trial months all the time. Once, when I called to cancel, they gave me several months’ free extension. They must have been desperate for customers. All the wildcat providers were undercutting them big time.
My father had to cancel his credit card to keep them from continuing to charge him. After 6 months, that seemed to be the easiest option.
Back in ancient times, we used to ban *!*@*.aol.com from IRC channels and servers to cut down on visitors from the Army Of Lamers.
I know I'm dating myself, but I used to collect the AOL 3-1/2" disks, unlock them, and use them to record my own files. Saved me $.50 to $1.00 each!
We'll talk about the Radio Shack audio cassettes I first used on my RS Model 1 in another thread... LOL!
bump
They started out as Quantum Link (?), designed for the Commodore Computer. They then split into several components … Commodore, Apple and PC. Eventually they merged into a common link for all computers as an access to the Internet. Our first and, at the time, our only access to the Internet. Then they got greedy, the rest is history.
Yes, but if you have a pre-existing plan it’s still $24.95.
There are still people out there with AOL accounts paying $49.95 a month.
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