Here is the letter AOL CEO Randy Falco has penned to the entire staff about its layoffs of 10 percent of its workforce–or 700 people–and other cost cuts, which the online service is announcing today.

“We’re at a pivotal point in AOL’s transformation, and need to be even more strategically focused and operationally efficient as we weather the economic storm,” wrote Falco, in part, about the move.

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Gone, Tim Tuttle of Truveo. Gone, the Birches of Bebo. Gone, Dave Morgan of Tacoda. Gone, many Quigos.
One of the more interesting little problems that AOL has had over the last few years, in regards to its acquisition of hot Internet companies, has been that it is situated deep in the bowels of the Time [...]

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After its AOL division paid out an insane $850 million for social networking site Bebo yesterday, one had to wonder if the true digital legacy of Time Warner will be as the perpetual gravy train for legions of Web players.

It certainly seems that way from the original AOL execs who “merged” their company with Time Warner in 2000 and cashed out at the peak right after the deal to the series of ad networking startup entrepreneurs who got acquired, took their payouts and skidaddled right on through to the two founders of Bebo–Michael and Xochi Birch–who didn’t even stay long enough for a latte after grabbing their chunk of the payday Time Warner was handing out in crisp bank notes for the social networking site they founded.

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In an interesting move, AOL made its second acquisition in a week by buying Yedda, an Israeli question-and-answer service with social elements.
The price for the start-up, founded in 2006, was not disclosed, although it recently raised $2.5 million. Last week, AOL confirmed it has bought the Quigo ad network at a price tag of upward [...]

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