Verizon Is Weighing a Sale of Yahoo, AOL (bloomberg.com) 88
According to Bloomberg, Verizon is considering selling AOL and Yahoo -- two once high-flying dot-com brands it purchased in 2015 and 2017, respectively. Bloomberg reports: Verizon Media could fetch as much as $5 billion [...]. The company is talking to Apollo Global Management about a deal, they said. It couldn't immediately be learned how a deal would be structured or if other suitors may emerge. No final decision has been made and Verizon could opt to keep the unit. The move comes as Verizon divests tertiary media assets while ramping up its focus on its wireless business and the the rollout of its 5G service. Last year, it agreed to sell the HuffPost online news service to BuzzFeed Inc. and it unloaded the blogging platform Tumblr in 2019. This divestiture would mark Verizon's final retreat from an expensive foray into online advertising, a strategy that never really took off.
Might as well sell them at this juncture.... (Score:2, Funny)
With epic losses. Leave it to Verizon to purchase at the peak and sell after the fire.
Barren Wuffet (Score:1)
Buy high, sell low.
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Oops, supposed to be "Wuffett". (That's what you do in the woods if you packed light.)
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With epic losses. Leave it to Verizon to purchase at the peak and sell after the fire.
That's unfair. You make it sound like Verizon is just bad at trading rather than an arsonist literally setting their own assets on fire.
Did you know Tumblr was sold by Verizon for $3m after Yahoo bought it for $1.1bn?
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The best thing to do with Old Yahoo (Score:2)
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Is to take it into the barn and treat it like Old Yeller. It sounds mean but it is the most humane thing to do.
(Google) "Told you. I knew he would go first."
* takes $20 bill *
(AOL) "Shut up, asshole."
Re: The best thing to do with Old Yahoo (Score:3)
Yahoo may be a dying dog, but AOL is the walking dead.
Re: The best thing to do with Old Yahoo (Score:4, Funny)
I believe the entirety of AOL's revenue stream is accounts that it bills monthly because the estates have not gotten around to closing the account.
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Wow, disproved humor based on hyperbole by taking statements at face value and then analysing the crap out of them. How whooshy of you. ;-)
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Mod parent funny.
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They should just become a paid mail service and get rid of everything else.
I bet a lot of people would pay a bit for periodic or lifetime access.
I would.
Yahoo email user since the mid-1990s. It's my permanent address.
Everything else they do is shit. Mail isn't that hard, but longevity is very important.
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> Everything else they do is shit. Mail isn't that hard, but longevity is very important.
Yahoo! has started doing a 72-96 hour block on mail coming from new IP's. If you spin up a new mail server, Yahoo! won't deliver your mail for a few days. And many people spin up new IP's frequently, for load, cost, and geodiversity. Nobody wants to pay extra to condition IP's just for Verizon being dumbasses.
It's possible to imagine how this could help with spam malware but literally nobody else is doing this. If
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Thanks for that. Now I think I understand what's been wrong over there.
But I'm just keeping the Yahoo account alive because too many old registrations point over there. I certainly wouldn't give it out as an email address for any serious purpose.
Also, I guess it feels sort of amusing to keep rejecting the new terms of service two or three times a month. They're going to have to pry that acceptance click out of my cold dead mouse's paw? (I want a monkey's paw joke, but I can't write jokes. Obviously.)
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As soon as I saw Verizon bought them, I immediately started to looking for alternative e-mail providers. I still have a couple of throw-away accounts with them, but have been more than happy with a "real"/paid provider.
I would hope whoever ends up with Yahoo's assets, keeps Yahoo Finance.
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You might be interested to learn that AOL's email system has actually been running on Yahoo's email system for the past several years.
How did we get here (Score:5, Insightful)
I would like to know why on earth Verizon bought Yahoo and AOL ?
And they are not the only company to do such things. One example that comes to mind is Compaq buying DEC and then HP doubles down on that stupid merger.
These people who specializes in Acquisitions must have a crack Sales Dept. getting these companies do such dumb things.
No one I know thought that was a good idea.
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I would like to know why on earth Verizon bought Yahoo and AOL ?
Dunno. IP? Patents? Real estate? IPv4 space? Hacked password collection? AOL keywords? There's probably a lot of odd reasons we don't think about, but maybe should considering these two have been around since the dial-up days.
Patent Portfolio is what comes to mind when you think of IBM value today, not computers or typewriters.
Re: How did we get here (Score:2)
10 years ago, Yahoo held spots on the "top 10 most trafficed websites in 2010".
That must mean they were somewhat relevant...
Re: How did we get here (Score:2)
Dammit...I can't proofread.
They held THREE spots on the top 10 most popular sites list.
That is why I think there must have been some relevance.
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I would like to know why on earth Verizon bought Yahoo and AOL ?
Dunno. IP? Patents? Real estate? IPv4 space? Hacked password collection? AOL keywords? There's probably a lot of odd reasons we don't think about, but maybe should considering these two have been around since the dial-up days.
In some cases, you might be right. But Yahoo/AOL?? What IP/Patents could they possibly have? Do they really own any prime, desirable real estate? They have been completely irrelevant for 20 years.
The hell does relevance have to do with owning real estate? If they chose a nice location 20 years ago for HQ, then they're probably sitting on a damn gold mine right about now. Here's a list of AOL acquisitions. Kinda doubt these are all shacks and shanties in Bumfuck, Nebraska.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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While AOL did buy the former British Aerospace headquarters in Sterling, VA, and built several new buildings on the site, most of those new buildings were mortgaged allegedly because AOL already knew their growth was not sustainable and never planned to keep them.
The CC3,4,5,6 buildings were sold off years ago.
Even their data centers were sold off.
CC2 is like an empty, burnt-out shell the last time I visited and if I remember correctly they were trying to figure out if they could parcel out the space for le
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"Patent Portfolio is what comes to mind when you think of IBM" - Those typewriter patents must be very valuable today.
Damn ignorance always getting in the way...here, let me help you up:
"IBM scientists and researchers received 9,130 U.S. patents in 2020, the most of any company, marking 28 consecutive years of IBM patent leadership."
That ain't 9,000 typewriter patents...
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I would like to know why on earth Verizon bought Yahoo and AOL ?
Dunno. IP? Patents? Real estate? IPv4 space? Hacked password collection? AOL keywords?
I can see this behind Compaq's purchase of DEC back in the day, but Yahoo/AOL? Those have been unproductive money pits for years. Let's think about it, what IP rights or patents could Yahoo/AOL possess (compared to, say any from among the FAANG?
There's probably a lot of odd reasons we don't think about, but maybe should considering these two have been around since the dial-up days.
Dial-up modems are still around. I see AOL like an undead Compuserve Zombie that refuses to die even after Darryl and Carol from TWD hit it in the head with a crossbow bolt, a hammer and a .20 gauge buckshot.
Patent Portfolio is what comes to mind when you think of IBM value today, not computers or typewriters.
Maybe. I just can't think what sort of relevant patent portfolio Yahoo/AOL could have today. They aren't Sun, DEC or Motorola (and they never have been.)
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AOL's patent portfolio was already sold off a couple years before the Verizon acquisition.
Re:How did we get here (Score:5, Insightful)
They think it nets economy of scale. The HP/Compaq/DEC merger was a prime example. Someone thought they could get all of the customers, eliminate most of the product lines and R&D and the customers would tolerate that. So they EOL half of the PC lines, Half of the X86 based server lines, all platforms except x86 and Itanium. Big shock: The customers didn't stick around.
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A lot of that was dumb, but cancelling all platforms but amd64 and Itanic made sense. Itanic turned out to be a flop but they didn't really have other options. HP's (etc.) own architectures cost too much to maintain and they couldn't afford to keep them going.
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Correction - on crack sales department
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The Verizon acquisitions were targeting value and trying to remain relevant if the winds shifted too much. They never should have gone through with Yahoo after the late revelations... at least not for any reasonable sum of money.
DEC/Compaq was not the worst merger at the time— DEC was struggling and Compaq wanted to get into more of the high-value customers. Ironically, Compaq might not have needed DEC to meet their goals, based on their data center success that came from commodity hardware. HP was
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Re:How did we get here (Score:5, Interesting)
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I found the Yahoo Finance app for android to be the best plain stock app.
And Yahoo Finance allows comments/conversations which I like.
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Not sure I would say it is the best for stock market research, but there are two things that I can note:
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They look at Google and see it is making boat loads of money. They look at Yahoo and think "hey, that's a bit like Google, if we just market it and make it default on our shitty platform it will become just like Google and we will be getting boat loads of cash!"
I see this happen time and time again in business. The people in charge don't understand the market or why something is popular, they just think they can get a slice of it by offering something superficially similar.
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No one I know thought that was a good idea.
I wonder if there were other factors which we don't see in the news. Or it was a good idea but certain other factors like management processes or hiring strategies that caused a good idea to go off the rails.
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As near as I can tell Verizon wanted to compete with other Internet giants like Google and Facebook. Obviously they couldn't just buy those companies. So they looked around and saw there were several dead companies that were similar available. And then they stitched those corpses together into a horrific flesh golem.
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Which raises the question of why they bought Huffington as part of said foray.
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Who's still using AOL? (Score:2)
Grandma who refuses to part with her 2001 era E-machine desktop and does not even know how to switch away from dialup?
This is a serious question.
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Can anyone say how reliable AOL is?
No, people using AOL cannot.
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But how many were actually still dialing up, even in 2017? That is the number of dial-up accounts still active, not users.
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No one needs to be using AOL. They bill accounts automatically. Some fraction of one-time users still have active accounts that they can bill, where checks are still being deposited.
This is the AOL business model now. Eventually the former users will be declared dead, the checks will stop being deposited, and the accounts will be closed.
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Remember the AOL telephone services? Of course nobody does. A decade after they were "discontinued" AOL was still raking in millions per month from those services.
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I have 2 free e-mail accounts. One of them is @yahoo.com, and the other is @netscape.net, which has been a redirect to @aol.com for yonks.
Wherever ownership goes, I just hope I can still use IMAP on both of those accounts.
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I know a few people still using @aol.com address. They said they don't want to let go of their old e-mail addresses. :/
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And good riddance. (Score:2)
Maybe now Verizon will actually take responsibility for email client support for their FiOS and DSL customers, instead of foisting it off on their hapless AOL and Yahoo lackeys, who can offer little more than finger-pointing toward FAQ web pages. (unless, of course, they couldn't care less and want them to to just use Gmail like everybody else...?)
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Uh, Yahoo! Mail and AOL.com/AIM.com e-mail still exist as free services over the web... with a lot less intrusive ads than GMail.
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It might surprise you that AOL mail has been hosted on Yahoo's mail platform starting a few years ago.
It's a shame because AOL's original mail system up until the mid-2000s was bulletproof.
cheree (Score:1)
So, to buy Yahoo... (Score:2)
I'd be pretty surprised if they get more than (Score:2)
1-2 billion for yahoo and AOL.
Verizon/Yahoo hasn't done anything other than shut down services since the purchase.
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Verizon was offended by the IM products because they competed with SMS. Verizon was also to blame for CNET's long form daily podcasts like Buzz Out Loud and The 404 being canceled because they insisted they were clogging the FIOS system.
Seems like the consolidation of the carriers down to 3 needs to be reworked... and T-Mobile/Sprint doesn't own much landlines to consumers.
Re:I'd be pretty surprised if they get more than (Score:5, Insightful)
1-2 billion for yahoo and AOL.
Verizon/Yahoo hasn't done anything other than shut down services since the purchase.
Shutting down things that they never should have bought n the first place.
Seriously. How do you run a compnay like this? Not just Verizon/Yahoo/AOL but many other companies as well. Spending huge amounts of money to buy companies that are useless crap and then selling them at a big loss a few years later. Who the fuck approves this shit?
Re:I'd be pretty surprised if they get more than (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: I'd be pretty surprised if they get more than (Score:1)
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Except for one thing...
Yahoo hosts AT&T's email. I wonder how much they get on rent-seeking for that.
Shut down and profit? (Score:2)
With AOL Platform, AIM, Y!IM, the Yahoo! Finance data system, and other things already shut down... how did that create value? Seems like they have to sell at a loss.
Twenty bucks. (Score:2)
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I'll give you 21 but I only want the domain names so I can point them to pornhub.
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You might make money on that.
I wondered what good they were when the groups they were hosting they killed. Like pour gasoline, diesel on that wooden bridge and light her up killed. Last message I have from them was for the most part a fuck you message. We're deleting your account for non-use. Sure, knock yourself out. Please delete it.
Embarrassing (Score:1)
I'll give you five bucks (Score:2)
Which I think it pretty generous, to be frank.
Jeff Epstein (Score:2)
Capitalism is broken (Score:1)
Capitalism is broken (no, it isn't.) (Score:2)
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You may as well ask someone how they could afford to pay for Netflix when they are paying off a car and a home. Because they make more in a month than the cost of their car and mortgage payments!
How is this worth $5 billion? (Score:2)
Enough already (Score:2)
OMG I'm tired of hearing about Yahoo and AOL. Ever since the days of unending AOL CDs I've hoped it would just die.
Okay - new idea: start a crowdfunding campaign to buy both properties. Then assign all IP to some friendly holding company (FSF? Wikipedia?) and just let them die already.