Like Marcel Proust nipping on a tea-soaked petite madeleine and finding himself awash in the memories of his youth, some of us of a certain age may be immediately transported to 1999 by the distinctive “Boo-da-loop… Ba-loop” call and response of AOL Instant Messenger. While you may have moved on from your early love affair with AIM, moving on to dalliances with texting, Facebook, WhatsApp, and so, so many others, AIM remained, patiently hoping you’d come back. Yet all the nostalgia in the world couldn’t save AIM, and so it will soon bid its final fare thee well.. [More]
AOL
Verizon Could Launch New Streaming Video This Summer
By 5.22.17
Verizon’s rumored over-the-top streaming TV service — not to be confused with its nearly universally panned two-year-old Go90 product — could be available as soon as next month, executives for the company reportedly revealed Monday. [More]
Yahoo Claims Its Brand Will Still Exist, Will Operate Under ‘Oath’ Division
By 4.4.17
Apparently the Yahoo brand isn’t going away as part of the Verizon merger. Rather, the brand will operate as a part of the new “Oath” division. [More]
UPDATED: Yahoo, AOL Brands To Be Part Of Verizon’s New ‘Oath’ Thing
By 4.3.17 — Updated: 4.4.17
AOL Still Exists, Laying Off 500 People
By 11.17.16
Six months after Verizon Communications paid $4.4 billion to buy AOL and its collection of media and technology companies, the top honcho at the ‘90s Internet brand says they’ll be laying off about 5% of the staff today, with around 500 employees expected to get their walking papers. [More]
It’s Obviously Delightful When The “You’ve Got Mail” Guy Is Your Uber Driver
By 11.7.16
There are few certainties in this world — we live, we die, that’s about it — but one thing is for sure: if the voice behind AOL’s “You’ve got mail!” greeting is your Uber driver, you’re gonna make him recite those famous words so you can post a video of it on the internet. [More]
Verizon Sets Stage To Purchase Second ’90s Internet Relic; Reportedly Bids $3B For Yahoo
By 6.7.16
A second round of bids for Yahoo’s core internet business — including search, mail, and news sites — is officially underway, and Verizon is reportedly coming in hot, offering $3 billion for the assets. [More]
24 Stories We Covered In 2015 That We Never Saw Coming
By 12.31.15
The following is a true story: One day, two Consumerist staffers were chatting about the work day. One said, “I can’t believe I’m writing about the legal ramifications of butt-dialing.” The other replied, “We should probably remember this conversation for a year-end story about things we didn’t expect to ever write in 2015.” A calendar alert was made, and our future selves were duly reminded. [More]
Coming Soon To An AOL Ad Network Near You: All That Data Verizon Collects On Mobile Users
By 10.7.15
When Verizon first announced its plans to acquire AOL back in May, jokes abounded. The name “AOL” still conjures the sound of modems screeching and a friendly digital voice announcing haltingly, “You’ve got mail!” It does not, on the other hand, immediately inspire one to think of a $4 billion media and data empire. But the latter is exactly what it is — and in conjunction with Verizon’s more pernicious tools, it may be about to get a whole lot bigger. [More]
Verizon Completes $4.4B Acquisition Of AOL
By 6.23.15
It’s not often you hear about a shotgun wedding between two tech companies, but that’s apparently what happened for Verizon and AOL, as the recently betrothed said today that they had officially completed a $4.4 billion acquisition proposed just a month ago. [More]
Verizon/AOL Merger: Good For Their Business, Bad For Your Privacy
By 5.13.15
Every day, the great amorphous mass of consumers creates millions upon millions of trackable, quantifiable pieces of data. Every purchase at every store. Every click on every website, every bit of geotagged data, every installed or opened app and every interaction on social media. All of it adds up together into one giant Mount Everest of data to be sliced, diced, bought, sold, and traded. [More]
Verizon Buys AOL For $4.4 Billion To Create Video Content, Ad-Sharing Mega-Company
By 5.12.15
Old tech and new tech are coming together in a massive $4.4 billion deal, with mobile service powerhouse Verizon Communications buying the brand of the ’90s AOL — a deal that gives the country’s largest mobile phone operator a stronger foothold in the race to create ad-content that targets customers as they move from desktops to mobile devices. [More]
2.15 Million People Still Pay AOL For Internet Access
By 5.12.15
Every so often, we like to check in with AOL, our ’90s onramp to the information superhighway that somehow still exists and has been working to remake itself as a media company. While sites like the Huffington Post and TechCrunch bring hundreds of millions of people to ad-supported stories and videos, AOL still makes tens of millions of dollars from their classic business model of collecting subscription fees for Internet access. [More]
83-Year-Old Racks Up $24,289 In AT&T Charges By Still Using AOL Dial-Up
By 4.28.15
Believe it or not, AOL still has more than 2 million paying customers who dial into the service to get Internet access. And for people whose online use is minimal, this may be the cheaper option — unless some glitch causes your modem to start dialing an international line, leaving you to rack up thousands of dollars in charges while your phone company pleads ignorance. [More]
News Sites Consider Moving Their Content Inside Facebook (Because That Worked So Well In The AOL Era)
By 3.24.15
There’s news in the world of news today, as some major sites are on the cusp of a new publishing deal with Facebook. The deal would actively keep their content inside of Facebook, rather than having links on everyone’s love-to-hate-it social network lead back out to other companies’ respective websites. But there is one specific lesson this deal highlights: even on the internet, you can’t escape the cycles of history. Somehow, everything old will be new again. [More]
Whatever Happened To GeoCities, Lycos, Netscape & Other Giants Of Web 1.0?
By 3.20.15
Long before Facebook and Twitter, well before even Friendster and MySpace, before the first dotcom bubble burst, in the eons before Google was a glint in anyone’s eye, there was the first web. In comparison to everything that’s come after it, you could call it Web 1.0 or perhaps even just “the dark ages.” But for anyone born before, say, 1990, this was the dawn of our now-ubiquitous digital world. But as the digital giants of yesteryear have been replaced by the now-ubiquitous Facebook and Google, how many are still in play now? [More]
Verizon CEO: Reports Of Any “Significant” Acquisition Chats “Not Accurate”
By 1.6.15
Amid reports yesterday indicating that Verizon Communications was toying with the idea of acquiring AOL or entering into some kind of joint venture, the company’s CEO is going on record as saying there’s nothing serious going on. [More]
Report: Verizon Exploring Acquisition Or Joint Venture With AOL
By 1.5.15
The first major marriage of two companies in 2015 may be taking shape just five days into the new year after reports surfaced Monday that Verizon Communications has approached AOL about a possible joint venture or acquisition. [More]
