Comments on: AOL+Bebo=More Rich Web Entrepreneurs!

By: Buyer’s Remorse or Not–AOL Is Not Considering Selling Bebo | Kara Swisher | BoomTown | AllThingsD

Wed, 28 Jan 2009 16:02:12 +0000

[...] in another post I did at the time: Thus, I am still trying to figure out why AOL–which was built on the pillars of community, [...]

By: E J Devinney

E J Devinney — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 01:51:56 +0000

There are a number of reasons that AOL hasn’t been able to leverage its assets in this area.

Fear has kept the product people from innovating, lest they make a mistake. Pride has kept them from looking realistically at their assets and the market *as it stands right now* (versus in the salad days) and determining objectively what to bring to customers. Arrogance has removed any real sense of urgency about delivering products to market so that they strike when the iron is hot. Fear helps limit delivery, too – the perfect is the enemy of the good at AOL, and for all their efforts the perfect hasn’t turned out to be very good once it’s finally shipped. By focusing on perfect home runs they lose the opportunity to win with singles.

The company has no shortage of smart people even now, and no shortage of assets and resources. There are structural and mental limitations that the leadership has not faced, let alone surmounted.

By: Daniel Lazarides

Daniel Lazarides — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 16:55:57 +0000

I would hardly call the acquisition of Bebo a “game-changer”; the network simply doesn’t have the population (or reputation) to make it one.

Furthermore, throwing money at marketing a social network isn’t always the best policy to increase its population. People want to join a network that their friends are on. I believe AOL should have spent $850m on building their own network around AIM, where people already have friends and networks set up through ‘Buddy Lists’.

I’m 21 and live in the UK and I don’t know anyone on Bebo, not even my 15 year old sister uses it anymore!

By: rod sandcones

rod sandcones — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 16:32:39 +0000

^I’d rather buy something already established, than a mere possibility. Obviously, AOl feels that Bebo was it’s best option. 850 Mill is nothing for a company like AOL. It’ll be exciting to see what they do with it. Bebo discs in the mail, anyone? :)

By: alan wilensky

alan wilensky — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:26:06 +0000

850M could have enabled an army of local and extended talent to launch new ideas, and burn rubber to get it into production. I can’t see how these over-valuated buyouts have helped the internet application technology sector.

All this does is take $$ out of the capex market that is needed for ground zero work.