AOL Dumps $1.2 Billion Worth of Acquisitions 122
destinyland writes "The social networking site Bebo is being sold for just 'a small fraction of the $850 million AOL paid for the site two years ago,' according to the Wall Street Journal. Since its acquisition, 'the site has been shedding users as fast as Facebook and Twitter have been gaining them,' according to one industry observer, quoting an April memo reportedly sent by an AOL executive arguing that Bebo 'has been declining and, as a result, would require significant investment in order to compete in the competitive social networking space.' Bebo's traffic is already down 44% from last year, according to the Wall Street Journal, attracting just 5 million unique US visitors in May (versus 130.4 million for Facebook). And earlier this month, AOL shed the instant messaging service ICQ for $187.5 million — which it had acquired in 1998 for over $408 million."
The leaders, in losing money. (Score:5, Funny)
AOL & Time Warner. AOL & Bebo. AOL and & ICQ. Gosh what's next...AOL and GM?
Wanna lose money? Follow AOL's lead...how is it that this company exists anymore?
Nah (Score:4, Funny)
They're just scared Amazon is going to sue them.
About half of that is in 30-Day Trial CD-ROMS. (Score:5, Funny)
BP has shown interest in using them to plug the hole.
Who? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:AOL Is Bad At This (Score:5, Funny)
*bing* (Score:5, Funny)
You've got fail!
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Re:AOL Is Bad At This (Score:1, Funny)
AOL is very bad at acquisitions. They are all gung-ho about buying companies, but they just sit on them and hope they continue to be relevant (if they ever were relevant).
I think you're overly negative. I've created a Web site with the Lycos Web designer and am in negotiations with AOL to sell it for $50 million dollars.
It uses animated gifs and LARGE PRINT TO ATTRACT CUSTOMERS TO PRODUCT SALES. The marketing MBA's at AOL obviously know a Winner when they see one.
Re:*bing* (Score:3, Funny)
Me too!!!!!!
Re:Come and go. (Score:3, Funny)
My partial differential equations prof said: "There are two notations for the sum of second derivatives, and ; They are like Bebo and Facebook", referring to the fact that the first is not used much, but the latter is really popular. IMMD
Re:Who? (Score:3, Funny)
The first place I ran across a mention of Bebo was in this song [youtube.com], which probably isn't a good sign...
Re:AOL needs to be stopped (Score:5, Funny)
They seem to ruin everything they touch.
Hopefully they'll acquire the Yankees next.
Re:AOL Is Bad At This (Score:3, Funny)
Well, they're consistently buying high and selling low. Their market strategy program probably has an inverted if-condition somewhere.
Re:About half of that is in 30-Day Trial CD-ROMS. (Score:3, Funny)
Can't they plug it with old AOL diskettes? There's billions of them in storage.
Re:AOL needs to be stopped (Score:3, Funny)
"They seem to ruin everything they touch."
They should stick to touching themselves.
Re:The leaders, in losing money. (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:2, Funny)