Hopefully TechCrunch and other platforms they now own will remain independent from a journalistic integrity point of view. Unlike SugarString.
Yeah, quite a few interesting permutations here. Some of the talk suggests Verizon could look to unload portions or all of the content production. Not sure yet what to make of it all, hence a post devoid of commentary.
Personally, I’m outraged. Verizon just showed up at my home to rip out the fibre optic line, claiming that dial-up will provide me with “significantly better performance”. I’m highly dubious.
Thinking seriously about switching to CompuServe.
@Chucky Do your research buddy. CompuServe was purchased by AOL years ago, so they’re owned by Verizon now too. Can’t wait to see how they screw up that fine service.
“Do your research buddy. CompuServe was purchased by AOL years ago, so they’re owned by Verizon now too.”
Fine. Correct me with your “facts”.
Now that Verizon has involuntarily switched me from fibre-optic to dial-up, I’ll just have to switch to EarthLink instead.
Personally, I think that Prodigy will be the wave of the future.
I think these 2.1 million aol dial up subscribers are the key to the deal…
$4.4b is a lot of money for a number/population that must be shrinking each month… I know they lost a customer a year or three ago when my great uncle moved into a nursing home. One former AOL employee I was chatting with today thinks it’s more about the Advertising.com platform. But I wonder how that performs – a few years back, they tried to get me on board and I was making only a few cents eCPM.
I heard on the radio today that AOL still has 1,000 employees here at the Dulles campus I drive past twice (or more) a day. And Verizon’s property around the corner, once MCI-Worldcom-Uunet, is probably half empty. So if they don’t move everyone out (permanently or to NY), I could see trying to save a few bucks and having AOL vacate the last of their campus buildings.
It’s all about the content platform, ad platform, and maybe original content/programming.
Wonder if it’ll be Verizon-only, e.g. you’ll need VZ or VZW service, or if they’ll continue AOL’s ISP agnostic stance.
BTW, I went to a Meetup at the Dulles campus a few months back. It was all about the AOL on apps for set top boxes and TVs. They are trying to be like Netflix + CNN + CNET + whatever.
My TiVo has several AOL video apps… that I’ve never launched.
“I know they lost a customer a year or three ago when my great uncle moved into a nursing home.”
Sure. But for every elderly person they lose, think about how many new ones they’ll gain with their clever rip-out-the-fibre-optic plan.
When the Verizon guys ripped out my FTTH, at first I was pissed. But then, after I realized they’d left me twenty convenient CD’s for AOL dial-up, and promised me that I’d have no hassles in canceling my service at any time in the future, I was hooked. So one person goes off to a nursing home, but hundreds of savvy consumers like me are there to pick up the slack. It’s a business that scales.
Hmmm…
Upon fifth thought, and realizing I already use the kickass eWorld icons for many folders, I’m now thinking of skipping AOL, CompuServe, EarthLink, and Prodigy for eWorld…
Naah – You’re all wrong. The Source beats alla them – CompuServe, Dow Jones, Prodigy….
I can, however, use some help with these ATDT commands for my Hayes modem, and what about those parity bits…?
Source is okay. But how about BIX. Or just dialing into a Waffle system and accessing straight Usenet. Or running a FidoNet node.
Also it’s 8-N-1 for parity. Ok. I’m old. Never got my Courier HST though. Always ran cheaper models.
“Or just dialing into a Waffle system and accessing straight Usenet.”
I like the way you think, sir. Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
(Crazy thing in reality is that I actually have a working modem hooked up to my Mac Mini. I just use it for managing our landline – LAN transmitted caller ID & logs on the WAN, plus one-touch dial-out from devices on the LAN, all using the great scriptable software Dialectic, and thus I’m still familiar with ATDT commands – but whole new Usenet worlds are now open to me in this Brave New World.)
A Times business reporter says it is AOL’s proprietary ad placing or some such tech thatVerizon really wants.
Best simple explanation of the logic here that I’ve seen.
(I’ve had the Ben Thompson blogpost open in a tab for the last day, but I hadn’t gotten around to reading it yet…)
The AOL Campus in Dulles is quite nice. I interviewed there last year, but it was pretty empty. It would be great if another tech company giant got the space and increased their presence in the DC area. We are supposed to be the 3rd biggest tech area, but not enough of these big guys put coding jobs out here….
Back in 2006, when I lived in Maryland and before their massive purge, I interviewed at AOL as well. Was a nice facility, although it would have been an insane commute. But my Sling Media opportunity came along and seemed way more interesting, so I ended discussions with AOL before we even got to brass tacks. As it turns out, I think the position I was looking at moved to New York (which I guess would have been a shorter trip than Sling in California). Interesting comment thread – I see Joel’s here. He passed along my resume last year as we work in similar circles. Although my resume document, vs work experience and skills themselves, isn’t very good. Probably didn’t help my case! Every job I’ve had since 2001 came via folks who knew me or knew my work and the resume was a formality for a HR folder.
“In a statement, Cablevision said: “Verizon has not been truthful to the public for nearly 10 years about FiOS. Verizon FiOS is not all fiber and, in fact, uses regular coaxial cable inside the home.”
Boo. Hiss.
Cablevision is being intellectually dishonest here, quite obviously. No idea of the legal deciders here, but boo, hiss on Cablevision, back here in reality.
(And hell, it’s fully besides the point, but I’ve got FIOS, and I don’t use coax in my home. Not that has anything to do with the merits here. Coax in the LAN is utterly separate from the correct advantages of the claim.)
Hopefully TechCrunch and other platforms they now own will remain independent from a journalistic integrity point of view. Unlike SugarString.
Yeah, quite a few interesting permutations here. Some of the talk suggests Verizon could look to unload portions or all of the content production. Not sure yet what to make of it all, hence a post devoid of commentary.
Personally, I’m outraged. Verizon just showed up at my home to rip out the fibre optic line, claiming that dial-up will provide me with “significantly better performance”. I’m highly dubious.
Thinking seriously about switching to CompuServe.
@Chucky Do your research buddy. CompuServe was purchased by AOL years ago, so they’re owned by Verizon now too. Can’t wait to see how they screw up that fine service.
“Do your research buddy. CompuServe was purchased by AOL years ago, so they’re owned by Verizon now too.”
Fine. Correct me with your “facts”.
Now that Verizon has involuntarily switched me from fibre-optic to dial-up, I’ll just have to switch to EarthLink instead.
Personally, I think that Prodigy will be the wave of the future.
I think these 2.1 million aol dial up subscribers are the key to the deal…
http://www.techtimes.com/articles/52087/20150512/believe-it-or-not-2-1-million-americans-still-subscribe-to-aol-dial-up-internet.htm
$4.4b is a lot of money for a number/population that must be shrinking each month… I know they lost a customer a year or three ago when my great uncle moved into a nursing home. One former AOL employee I was chatting with today thinks it’s more about the Advertising.com platform. But I wonder how that performs – a few years back, they tried to get me on board and I was making only a few cents eCPM.
I heard on the radio today that AOL still has 1,000 employees here at the Dulles campus I drive past twice (or more) a day. And Verizon’s property around the corner, once MCI-Worldcom-Uunet, is probably half empty. So if they don’t move everyone out (permanently or to NY), I could see trying to save a few bucks and having AOL vacate the last of their campus buildings.
https://twitter.com/davezatz/status/598095064607293440
It’s all about the content platform, ad platform, and maybe original content/programming.
Wonder if it’ll be Verizon-only, e.g. you’ll need VZ or VZW service, or if they’ll continue AOL’s ISP agnostic stance.
BTW, I went to a Meetup at the Dulles campus a few months back. It was all about the AOL on apps for set top boxes and TVs. They are trying to be like Netflix + CNN + CNET + whatever.
My TiVo has several AOL video apps… that I’ve never launched.
“I know they lost a customer a year or three ago when my great uncle moved into a nursing home.”
Sure. But for every elderly person they lose, think about how many new ones they’ll gain with their clever rip-out-the-fibre-optic plan.
When the Verizon guys ripped out my FTTH, at first I was pissed. But then, after I realized they’d left me twenty convenient CD’s for AOL dial-up, and promised me that I’d have no hassles in canceling my service at any time in the future, I was hooked. So one person goes off to a nursing home, but hundreds of savvy consumers like me are there to pick up the slack. It’s a business that scales.
Hmmm…
Upon fifth thought, and realizing I already use the kickass eWorld icons for many folders, I’m now thinking of skipping AOL, CompuServe, EarthLink, and Prodigy for eWorld…
Naah – You’re all wrong. The Source beats alla them – CompuServe, Dow Jones, Prodigy….
I can, however, use some help with these ATDT commands for my Hayes modem, and what about those parity bits…?
Source is okay. But how about BIX. Or just dialing into a Waffle system and accessing straight Usenet. Or running a FidoNet node.
Also it’s 8-N-1 for parity. Ok. I’m old. Never got my Courier HST though. Always ran cheaper models.
“Or just dialing into a Waffle system and accessing straight Usenet.”
I like the way you think, sir. Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
(Crazy thing in reality is that I actually have a working modem hooked up to my Mac Mini. I just use it for managing our landline – LAN transmitted caller ID & logs on the WAN, plus one-touch dial-out from devices on the LAN, all using the great scriptable software Dialectic, and thus I’m still familiar with ATDT commands – but whole new Usenet worlds are now open to me in this Brave New World.)
A Times business reporter says it is AOL’s proprietary ad placing or some such tech thatVerizon really wants.
Best simple explanation of the logic here that I’ve seen.
(I’ve had the Ben Thompson blogpost open in a tab for the last day, but I hadn’t gotten around to reading it yet…)
The AOL Campus in Dulles is quite nice. I interviewed there last year, but it was pretty empty. It would be great if another tech company giant got the space and increased their presence in the DC area. We are supposed to be the 3rd biggest tech area, but not enough of these big guys put coding jobs out here….
Back in 2006, when I lived in Maryland and before their massive purge, I interviewed at AOL as well. Was a nice facility, although it would have been an insane commute. But my Sling Media opportunity came along and seemed way more interesting, so I ended discussions with AOL before we even got to brass tacks. As it turns out, I think the position I was looking at moved to New York (which I guess would have been a shorter trip than Sling in California). Interesting comment thread – I see Joel’s here. He passed along my resume last year as we work in similar circles. Although my resume document, vs work experience and skills themselves, isn’t very good. Probably didn’t help my case! Every job I’ve had since 2001 came via folks who knew me or knew my work and the resume was a formality for a HR folder.
“In a statement, Cablevision said: “Verizon has not been truthful to the public for nearly 10 years about FiOS. Verizon FiOS is not all fiber and, in fact, uses regular coaxial cable inside the home.”
Boo. Hiss.
Cablevision is being intellectually dishonest here, quite obviously. No idea of the legal deciders here, but boo, hiss on Cablevision, back here in reality.
(And hell, it’s fully besides the point, but I’ve got FIOS, and I don’t use coax in my home. Not that has anything to do with the merits here. Coax in the LAN is utterly separate from the correct advantages of the claim.)