Google and AOL, Sittin' in a Tree

[yasunobu13]

link

According to reports over the weekend in The New York Times and elsewhere, Time Warner is expected to announce tomorrow that it will renew its partnership with Google, which will make a $1 billion investment in AOL in exchange for a 5% stake in the company.

While the actual terms have yet to be disclosed, one aspect of the deal is troubling. The Times reports, "Google, which prides itself on the purity of its search results, agreed to give favored placement to content from AOL throughout its site, something it has never done before."

[Sybersnake]

uh, oh. Wait, google has a billion in cash lying around, wtf?

[gerbick]

Google has a couple of billions sitting around dude.

But into AOL? They're losing cash as fast, if not faster, than Sony. 99 Billion, yes... with a big "B" in 2003, who knows what now, losses for AOL. Sony lost like 38 Billion, again with a big "B", last year.

[indivision]

---> see Future of the Internet.

[The_e-Tahn]

AOL+ Google? what the heck are the Googolians smoking??

[gerbick]

Googolians

Had to quote this.

[yasunobu13]

Just heard on NPR some ideas why they'll be doing this. Google supplies search results to AOL right now and about 10% of Google's income is from AOL. Microsoft was thinking of buying part of AOL, which would eventually lead to Google getting the boot and a lot less money. So, Google decided to beat Microsoft to it in order to keep the partnership and stick it to MS a little.

So, maybe I editorialized a little