Time Warner Considering Demerging with AOL 105
Gracenotes writes "According to the Daily Telegraph, America Online CEO Jonathan Miller notes that AOL might be successful enough to break away from Time Warner and still remain in business. According to Miller, AOL is providing many online services, which provide competition against Google, Yahoo, and other rivals. Since its merger with Time Warner and plummet in value, such features have been increasingly emphasized."
Providing services? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hooray for AOL... (Score:5, Funny)
AOL's Niche market (Score:3, Funny)
win win situation (Score:0, Funny)
Formatted! (Score:0, Funny)
AzeroL: OMG TK! HAX!
T-dub: OMG, JOIN CT A0!
AzeroL: LOL K THX!
T-dub: WE RNT DOING VARY GUD!
AzeroL: K I WILL RETHRINKG STRATEGY! FOCUS ON SEARCH SERV1C35!
T-dub: LOL K RGR.
Ten minutes later...
T-dub: YAY!
AzeroL:
AzeroL: WOW, OK, I AM GOING T
T-dub: WHY?
AzeroL: KTHXBYE
Competition? (Score:5, Funny)
Obligatory Onion reference (Score:2, Funny)
The Onion, 2003-03-12
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/27938 [theonion.com]
ATLANTA--According to a videotaped message airing exclusively on CNN, media mogul Ted Turner has sent himself back in time to January 2000 to avert the catastrophic merger of America Online and Time Warner.
"By the time you see this, I will have returned to Year Zero of the AOL Time Warner merger in a time machine of my own design," said Turner in the three-minute message, which first aired Monday on the Turner-owned cable news channel. "I will doggedly pursue [AOL Time Warner chairman] Steve Case and [former Time Warner CEO] Gerald Levin to stop this horribly misguided union of New Media and Old Media. And I will not return to my own time until the merger has been prevented."
AOL acquired Time Warner on Jan. 12, 2000, when the companies boasted a combined market value of $181.5 billion. The alliance quickly proved ill-fated, as few of the media synergies it promised proved feasible or profitable. This January, amid a plunging stock price and news that the new company posted a record $99 billion loss in 2002, Turner announced his resignation as AOL Time Warner vice-chairman.
Turner spokespersons say the mysterious, unseen time-travel device was developed under a veil of extreme secrecy at his Techwood Drive headquarters in Atlanta. Little else about the machine or Turner's mission is known.
"From what we understand, the machine acts only on living human flesh," Turner spokesman Marty Wells said. "If Mr. Turner has been successful, he has materialized in January 2000 completely nude, with no ID or money, save for a few billion dollars in Year 2000-value Time Warner stock. To survive, he'll need to steal clothing and rely on whatever crude weapons he can fashion with his bare hands."
Market watchers have expressed skepticism about Turner's chances.
"The merger occurred at the height of the Internet bubble, when conventional wisdom held that so-called 'New Economy' companies like Yahoo!, Excite, and AOL were the wave of the future," said Maria Bartiromo, host of CNBC's Closing Bell. "In such a heady, bullish financial climate, [Turner's] warnings of impending doom will likely be dismissed by Case and Levin as the ravings of a madman."
Corporate hubris, physicists say, is not the only obstacle facing Turner on his dramatic mission.
"Altering the flow of time is a dangerous and complex proposition," said Dr. Arthur Wistrom, a University of Chicago physics professor. "If Turner is not careful, he may unintentionally change the course of his own history, causing, for example, something to go awry with his loving, happy marriage to Jane Fonda."
Compounding Turner's troubles is an unconfirmed report that enemy forces within AOL have responded with their own time-travel initiative, dispatching back in time hundreds of cyborg drones disguised as ordinary mailmen to deliver CD-ROMs promising thousands of hours of free AOL access to every human household.
"Why anyone at AOL would want to do such a thing remains a mystery, as they lost more in the merger than anyone," Bartiromo said. "Perhaps somewhere within the vast Internet network of AOL subscribers, some malevolent cybernetic force has achieved sentience and is bent on the destruction of its human masters."
Turner's time-jump represents the latest in a series of high-stakes gambits for the maverick multi-billionaire.
"From his conversion of an independent Atlanta TV station into a cable 'superstation' to his purchase of the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks, his launch of CNN, and the historic merger of his media empire with Time Warner, Turner has built a career on taking big risks," Fortune reporter Doug Bergeron said. "But traveling back in time all by himself, a lone corporate soldier from the future facing nigh-impossible odds--that is arguably the most daring move he has made yet as an entrep
have they tried calling AOL yet? (Score:5, Funny)
TimeW: Well, I'd like to cancel my service
AOL: sorry to hear that, can we offer you our high speed internet services?
TimeW: No, thats ok.. I just want to cancel the account, I'm not a n00b anymore.
AOL: have you tried our great new chatting shizz?
TimeW: look, I want to quit, do it now plz kthx
AOL: I"m having a hard time understanding exactly what you want me to do?
(insert 9 more minutes of infuriating banter here)
anyway.. Time Warner knows they have a dinosaur on their hands.
The conversation will go something like this.. (Score:5, Funny)
AOL Exec: Really? Why do you want to demerge with us?
TW: I guess you weren't as profitable as we hoped.
AOL: Well, if I could offer you 10,000 free AOL shares would you consider not demerging?
TW: Look, it's a done deal. We're demerging. Just do it.
AOL: Really? You're sure I can't change your mind?
TW: We're demerging, dammit!
AOL: Let me put you onto my manager.
TW: Hey, wait, I just want to demerge *transfer*
AOL VP: So, sir. I gather you're thinking of demerging. Are you aware of the many benefits being merged with AOL offers.
TW: JESUS CHRIST! Just Dememerge already?
AOL VP: Okay, sir, just let me put you through to our demerging department.
*click*
TW: Hello? Hello? Fuckers! They hung up on me!
Obligatory (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Are they serious? AOL? Successful? (Score:5, Funny)
My uncle swears that AOL's browser is WAY better than MSIE, Netscape, or Opera (I've had him use all of them over trying to find one he can use). AOL works and the others never do - including allowing him to login to e-bay and page rendering. I wouldn't say "internet savvy" as much as "computer savvy".
He dropped DSL to go back to dial up because it was too "hard" to add a new e-mail through the browser - he needed AOL. I'm not real sure how he is taking the change. I know he is happy to be back in the fold, but I still hear him say he is going to go do something tonight that I know dial-up will never do (for instance, download and burn a DVD - good luck getting that done in a few hours on dial-up even though he swears it works fine). I think there is a certain amount of pride that will not allow him to say I am correct - I know he didn't download a 200+ meg file in the last 15 minutes on dial-up regardless of what he tells me.
*shrug*. I can not really understand being that clueless on anything. While there are many many many things I know nothing about I tend to either a) trust those that are experts and do as they say (and not argue with them) or b) learn enough to do it myself. Option A isn't a big deal - there are too many things out there to know enough about (for instance, I depend on a car mechanic even though I *could* learn to do it on my own - I just do not have the time to do so and I do not enjoy working on a vehicle). Though even then I try and learn *something* about any thing I use daily/weekly, enough so that I can somewhat tell if someone is trying to rip me off or enough so that I can converse/understand what the experts tell me is wrong.
There is obviously a market for those types of people. While my uncle is one of the worst I know, he still is not that unique. And I do not think they will ever really advance, they do not want too.
AOL should demerge with the _real_ internet (Score:2, Funny)
When I see that someone has an aol.com email address I know exactly what kind of "skilled" "CS" "expert" he is and can skip most (if not all) questions of the job interview.
That saved me a lot of time in the past.
Re:The conversation will go something like this.. (Score:4, Funny)
AOL Exec: Really? Look. It's _US_ who bought _YOU_. So _WE_ are going to demerge with _YOU_, not the other way 'round.
TW: Ha ! Loser. We are bigger now. _WE_ are going to demerge with _YOU_.
AOL: Hell no ! _WE_ are going to demerge with _YOU_ motherf$%^# !
TW: No ! Because I'm going to call the demerge department now !
AOL: Not if I can get there quicker ! Hello ?! Hello ?! Fucker ! He hung up on me !
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:As long as they don't... (Score:3, Funny)
Clueless, uses MS Windows + AOL
Non-clueless, block all that is AOL,
Non-clueless, internet experience improves 30,000%
No problem
Re:Providing services? (Score:5, Funny)
> words, or that they are being used correctly.
Like "Honesty," "Integrity" and "Ethics" for example.
Re:Providing services? (Score:1, Funny)