AOL buying Huffington Post

[Stitch]

This move doesn't seem to bode well for the Patch model. Don't know what to think. Arianna Huffington will take control of AOL's editorial content, including Patch. I don't know how long Patch can last now.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/07/business/media/07aol.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes

 

[slappy4428]

Is on the AOL/Fanhouse thread
http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/posts/2987562/

 

[Stitch]

This shouldn't be buried in a multi-page thread about Fanhouse and people bitching about Garry Howard.

 

[LongTimeListener]

This shouldn't be buried in a multi-page thread about Fanhouse and people bitching about Gerry Howard.

Agreed. Enormous media deal.

Well, this ought to **** up the Huffington Post but good. If one thing is for certain after the last 10 years, it's that AOL can't do anything right. If there is another uncertainty, it is that Tim Armstrong is a complete idiot, and nobody at AOL is willing to tell the emperor he has no clothes.

Thpo anyone who thought HuffPo could be a true force in liberal politics, sorry.

 

[dooley_womack1]

What a revival of an image for Arianna. When her husband was running for the Senate against Feinstein, Ms. Huffington was regarded as a Grade A flake. Not having been a follower of the Huffington Post, I'm just wondering if someone in the know about such things can tell us whether the flake image is true, or is she a lot more than a figurehead?

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

There's big money to be made in writing for free ... for the people who don't pay the writers.

 

[SeanKennedy]

Absolutely huge. My first thought was "Goodbye to what we knew as HuffPo."

 

[HejiraHenry]

I loved her on "Green Acres."

 

[Stitch]

I loved her on "Green Acres."

She's much better on "The Cleveland Show."

 

[sgreenwell]

This move doesn't seem to bode well for the Patch model. Don't know what to think. Ariana Huffington will take control of AOL's editorial content, including Patch. I don't know how long Patch can last now.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/07/business/media/07aol.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes

She gave the keynote address at the Patch conference in late October about how she thought it was a swell idea. She could have just been BS'ing, of course, but I don't really think the two things (HuffPost and Patch) would be at odds with one another.

 

[BYH]

I look forward to the thread in early 2013 about AOL folding the Huffington Post brand into Newsweek.

 

[SF_Express]

Saw this first thing this morning. Very big, very strange to me.

I'm not dumb enough to think it's all that simple, so lets get that out of the way before you jump on me, but still: There's something extra disturbing about AOL spending $315 million on Huffington Post the same months they jettison most of FanHouse for $5 million.

 

[Mizzougrad96]

I look forward to the thread in early 2013 about AOL folding the Huffington Post brand into Newsweek.

Newsweek is too mainstream. Think of a news magazine that nobody has read since 1995 and replace it with that.

 

[Fran Curci]

Does this mean there could be a staff meeting led by Garry Howard and Arianna Huffington?

 

[Mizzougrad96]

Does this mean there could be a staff meeting led by Garry Howard and Arianna Huffington?

Who zee **** is zis moron?

 

[TigerVols]

AOL just paid $315 million for a site that has done less original reporting in 5 years than Patch does in a day.

Good grief -- a news aggregator is worth $315 million, but news generators like Gannett and the like are barely breathing? What's going to happen to the Drudges and the HuffPos when the companies that actually generate the news for them to link to go under?

AOL is now like the NFL, but only if college football was teetering on the verge of extinction.

 

[Lugnuts]

I didn't see it as a total aggregator because I often read the HuffPo contributors... but I'm so with you on your point.

HuffPo was a cool site... but I'm not sure the well-educated left-leaners who like it will appreciate the whole corporate overlord thing. The brand is already significantly devalued with this deal.

This reminds me of when Time Warner came in and ****ed up CNN, a deal Ted Turner calls a horrible mistake.

Human beings are simply incapable of letting a cool thing stay that way. They must cash out and destroy.

 

[YankeeFan]

AOL just paid $315 million for a site that has done less original reporting in 5 years than Patch does in a day.

Spot on. This is a ****ing joke. Arriana is the ****ing Wizard of Oz with this deal.

There's no way this doesn't end in disaster.

 

[YankeeFan]

This is classic:


@SteveCase

AOL to Buy Huffington Post; Tim Armstrong says "1 + 1 will equal 11" Really? That wasn't my experience.

 

[YankeeFan]

I think it's funny that they say Arriana will be in charge of all AOL Media and then include Mapquest.com in the list of properties.

Is there a way to infuse your editorial point of view into Mapquest?