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| Friday, 14 March 2008 | |
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Irony as AOL, the most reckless of dotcom 1.0 era companies, splashes US$850 million on teen social networking site in a bid to cement its Web 2.0 era credentials.
AOL, the nanny-ish ISP arm of Time-Warner, is paying US$850mn for Bebo, the teen-aimed social networking site. US companies have a weird relationship with social networking sites. In 2005, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp paid US$580mn to buy the parent of MySpace (although he would get rid of it he could, now). Microsoft and Google have nibbled away at Facebook and the Beast of Redmond paid US$240mn for a slim stake in Facebook, valuing the latter at US$15bn. As if. But don’t let me colour your views on this deal. Here are the movers and shakers, whose mixture of eloquence and ignorance seem to challenge each syllable of every word they speak: “Bebo is the perfect complement to AOL’s personal communications network and puts us in a leading position in social media,” said Randy Falco, Chairman and CEO, AOL. “What drew us to Bebo was its substantial and fast-growing worldwide user-base, its vision of a truly social web, and the monetization opportunities that leverage Platform-A across our combined global audience. This positions us to offer advertisers even greater reach and marketers significant insights into the desires and needs of consumers.” “AOL understands the shifting dynamics of the Web and has clearly demonstrated its commitment to leveraging the ever-increasing power of social networks,” said Bebo President, Joanna Shields. “With one and the same vision in this area, it was a natural progression for Bebo to join AOL, and we look forward to working together to continue to expand the online social experience globally.” “Bebo’s dynamic management team recognizes that the Internet is less about destination and more about connecting people, culture and lifestyles,” said Ron Grant, President and COO, AOL. “This acquisition supports our key objectives – accelerating the growth, engagement and monetization of one of the world’s most engaged online communities.” With respect to those individuals, this is utter crap. And there’s some previous at work here. AOL famously paid a mint (US$4.2bn) to acquire Netscape, the leading provider of browser software, back in 1998. Likewise, the TW group’s past acquisitions include faddish no-hopers such as Atari and TBS. The US$164bn merger with AOL (who bought whom?) was a high-water mark in 2000’s dot.com stupidity. This deal suggests that the spring tide is coming in, anew. People who should know better seem to know very little at all. Back to the gurgler. Jim Chalmers |
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