Gawker
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exits
AOL Boots Loser CEO for Google's Tim Armstrong
At last, AOL has done something right: The Time Warner Internet unit has hired Google's Tim Armstrong as its new CEO, booting the laughably incompetent duo of CEO Randy Falco and COO Ron Grant. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by Nick Denton: Why are you so sure he's the best man for the job? He's no product guy -- and arguably that's... 4 Responses | Other threads
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steve ballmer
Jon Miller drops out, so who's getting the top online gig at Microsoft?
Former AOL CEO Jon Miller, reportedly Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's favorite to lead the company's new online division, withdrew his name from consideration yesterday because he'll soon be joining Yahoo's board. So if not Miller, who's going to take on the task of saving Microsoft by building its presence on the Web? The top names under consideration: More » -
mysteries
Did AOL buy Bebo to tempt Yahoo into a merger?
No one can make sense of AOL's $850 million Bebo buy, not even Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes, who is dropping hints that his company overpaid for the social network. AOL CEO Randy Falco and COO Ron Grant, shown here in a deliciously awkward moment with Bebo president Joanna Shields, negotiated the deal in secret, to the disbelief of their underlings. But there's one strategic way in which the Bebo buy makes sense. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by Niemal: Since mergers and acquisitions have seemingly devolved into a revenue tug-of-war over the same stupid ads, at least there's hope... more » | Other threads
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d6 live coverage
Microsoft, AOL talking? Our spy photo says yes
CARLSBAD, CA — Here's Microsoft dealmaker Hank Vigil chatting up AOL COO Ron Grant over lunch at the D6 conference. Why is that interesting? Because we overheard Vigil gabbing away on his cell phone earlier today about the "economic terms" of some deal. Microsoft famously made a run at merging its online businesses with Time Warner's AOL a few years ago. As with its recent talks with Yahoo, Microsoft only succeeded at driving its target into Google's arms; Google has a search deal with AOL, and owns 5 percent of the company. Could AOL be an option once more for Microsoft? Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes is set to take the stage soon. While he's not likely to say anything about talks, it's a safe bet Vigil and Grant will be seeing more of each other.
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By Owen ThomasComment by categorically: Hiding in the bushes? I don't know if I should laugh or cry.... more » | Other threads
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crime
Former AOL hardballers take it on the chin
AOL's dirty dealings are all in the past, right? With the SEC filing charges against eight former AOL Time Warner execs for their roles in inflating AOL's online ad revenue between 2000 and 2002, that's no doubt what present management would like you to think. Former head of business affairs David Colburn, former controller James MacGuidwin, and two others agreed to settlements and will pay back all ill-gotten gains with interest. The four others — former division CFOs John Michael Kelly and Joseph Ripp, executive Steven Rindner, and accountant Mark Wovsaniker — will contest the SEC's charges. The charges stem from an investigation the Washington Post began in 2002, which revealed that as it merged with Time Warner, AOL's business-affairs group completed a series of unconventional deals in order to boost its online ad sales numbers. In July 2002, the Post reported: More »
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Comment by ThayerHamjelly: The SEC filed civil fraud charges against former AOL Time Warner CFO Mike Kelly, ad sales quarterback David... more » | Other threads
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bebo
Bebo buy was AOL CEO's super-duper secret
AOL CEO Randy Falco and President Ron Grant — check out the photo and you'll see why the rank and file call them "Smithers and Burns" — kept plans to buy fourth-place social network Bebo secret from AOL's other top execs. Acquisitions talks are often kept quiet, but BoomTown sources say Falco and Grant were more secretive than usual. Can't say we blame them. The exchange — "We're targeting Bebo." "Who?" — has to get old.
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Comment by Davion: Holy shit they really do look like Smithers and Burns. How does anyone take them seriously? more » | Other threads
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blood in the boardroom
AOL's "human computer" may be scrapped
Jeffrey Bewkes begins work today as chief executive of Time Warner, the world's biggest old-school media conglomerate. One person who won't be celebrating Bewkes' ascension is Ron Grant, who runs day-to-day operations at Time Warner's internet division, AOL, which is downtown New York's biggest internet business since the headquarters moved from Virginia. Grant, an AOL veteran who masterminded some of the sketchier deals of the last internet boom but returned from disgrace, is so brainy that he's been nicknamed "the human computer". But the new Time Warner boss doesn't rate his mechanical exec's managerial competence. Grant is pictured here: better grab hold of that handrail.
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By Nick DentonComment by WillVille: If Ron's an example of a 'Human Computer' THANK-GOD for the real thing. I'VE SEEN BLUE SCRRENS OF DEATH WITH MORE... more » | Other threads
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rumormonger
AOL, meet the new boss
Come January, Jeff Bewkes will be Time Warner's new CEO, displacing Dick Parsons. The change was widely expected since Bewkes's appointment as chief operating officer in 2005. That's also when AOL, for the first time, fell under Bewkes's command. AOL CEO Randy Falco was widely seen as a Bewkes hire, and Bewkes's hand was also seen in the purchase of Tacoda, an ad-targeting firm headed by Curt Viebranz, who formerly worked for Bewkes at HBO. The most intriguing rumor I've heard: When things settle down at AOL, Falco could be headed upstairs to fill Bewkes's recently vacated COO spot — and Viebranz would then become AOL's next CEO. More » -
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aol
Your 2007 commemorative layoff souvenirs
Welcome to D-Day, AOL employees! Today is the reported day when 2,000 AOL employees will be released into the wild. Your consolation prize? Four to 12 months' severance and, we hear, lump-sum payments of up to $50,000 to make up for missed bonuses. Not satisfied with that? Valleywag reader bobzmudaguy has created a line of commemorative T-shirts to recognize this momentous occasion. Our favorite? This one, celebrating the Smithers and Burns relationship between AOL head Randy Falco and his lackey, COO Ron Grant. We hope, for the pint-sized Grant's sake, that the shirts come in extra-extra-small, to go along with the size of his layoff-loving heart. (Photo by bobzmudaguy) More »
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Comment by Bitter Man: I'm glad they laid me off today. That whole company is full of self-serving idiots. I just wish my severance... more » | Other threads
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rumormonger
AOL layoff details revealed
VIENNA, VA. — A source close to AOL's upcoming layoffs has shared numbers exclusively with Valleywag. The expected body count? 4,000 — a third of the estimated 12,000-person staff of the pain-wracked Internet giant. (Update: In a companywide email, CEO Randy Falco now says 2,000 employees out of a shrunken staff of 10,000 will be laid off.) The Dulles, Va. headquarters alone will see 400 jobs eliminated. Member Services, the organization responsible for AOL's rapidly defecting dialup customers, may get cut by as much as 90 percent. A data center in Reston, Va. is closing, with the facility up for sale, and another one in nearby Manassas could be on the block in the future. As deep as those cuts go, however, they may not be all. Remember the old adage "Measure twice, cut once?" Don't worry — neither do AOL CEO Randy Falco and COO Ron Grant. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by Iknowyouknow: I've heard that Ron has personally made many of the decisions about where to cut. The problem is, that... more » | Other threads
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layoffs
AOL HR chief leaves, taking one for his team
VIENNA, VA. — How do you now you're fired at an Internet company? When your biography's removed from the website. AOL's Lance Miyamoto, head of HR, has left the building. As a Valleywag tipster first told us and Silicon Alley Insider confirms, Miyamoto is the executive who's quitting in protest of new week's layoffs. (We had guessed, incorrectly, that it might be Kevin Conroy or BIll Wilson.) The question, though: Were AOL CEO Randy Falco and COO Ron Grant so furious over leaks that they fired him? Or was he allowed, nevertheless, to resign? More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by ifwallscouldtalk: @kilcarfarmva: If you thought who was running it now is bad, RUMOR has it that the queen (aka the "stump")... more » | Other threads
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aol
I'm in your backyard, talking to your employees
VIENNA, VA. — I grew up in this northern Virginia town 20 minutes outside Washington, D.C. As did the company formerly known as America Online, before it moved to the more-distant suburb of Sterling — sorry, "Dulles." That's where it will continue to be headquartered for a few more months, before its top executives decamp to New York. Somehow I doubt that AOL CEO Randy Falco knows, or cares, about that piece of AOL's history, as he and COO Ron Grant prepare to dismember the struggling Time Warner Internet business. I'm the first to admit that I'm a geek nostalgia junkie. And really, do AOL's roots have much to do with any of the problems it's facing today? More » -
lazy valleywag
Nasty nicknames for AOL's bosses
We're told that AOL CEO Randy Falco and chief sidekick officer Ron Grant are so annoyingly inseparable that they've been dubbed "Rondy." But we also hear that the rank and file, ticked off by moves like Rondy's rerouting of the corporate jet, have much meaner monikers for their new overlords. Heard any good ones? -
aol
AOL Denies Its Copying Of Yahoo
CONFONZ — The lovely thing about having a relatively well read gossip blog is that people bring the gossip to you. Case in point: the AOL Beta that resembles Yahoo's page. Someone inside AOL, or at least, inside AOL's heating ducts, brings us this report on the words of Ron Grant at yesterday's AOL management summit.You probably can't use this since I can't supply you with the video feed, but yesterday in AOL's Management Summit, while defending his choice of copying Yahoo's portal, Grant suggested that we "invented the left nav" and many other web standards, so that, in essence, we aren't copying, since we innovated these things in it the first place.
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By confonzComment by Iknowyouknow: Don't forget roundtripping, the human computer and his former colleagues did a lot of innovative work there, too. more » | Other threads
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aol
AOL's new chief demotivator
AOL's human "computer," Ron Grant, is building an elite team of high-tech ubermenschen to lead the Dulles-based online service back to technological dominance. Or maybe not. Former CNet employees are snickering over Grant's choice to head AOL's platforms division, the weightlifting, Corvette-driving, cat-loving Ted Cahall. According to one former CNet staffer, Cahall left such a miasma of bad feeling that the exodus continues a full year after he left the San Francisco tech publisher. -
aol
Grant to Staffers: Merry Fucking Christmas
SCOTT KIDDER — Randy Falco's right-hand man and human "computer" — newly-appointed President and COO Ron Grant — referred to by new AOL chief Randy Falco as "my computer" — has a holiday message for AOL's tens of thousands of employees: Have a good holiday weekend, and stay the fuck away from your email! More »
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