AOL Purchase Bebo - Anyone Else Think This Is Doomed Already?
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AOL, one of the more hated ISPs due to their horrific software and awful support, are purchasing the social networking website Bebo for $850m (£417m). Bebo is currently the third largest social networking website, behind Myspace and Facebook. Bebo have more than 40 million members worldwide, so there will be plenty of users for AOL to deliver their advertising drivel to.
The price of the Bebo brand is rather insignificant when compared to the price that Microsoft paid ($240m)for a paltry 1.6% of Facebook last year. Or in fact, the price that was paid for Myspace by News Corp ($580m) in 2005. News Corp now value the Myspace brand at more than $15bn. I’d love to have some of what they’re smoking…
There has been a lot of interest in social networking sites over the last couple of years and it is easy to see why. Social networking websites are seen as a very valuable method of online advertising due to the fact that the sites’ members post information about themselves and their interests and adverts can be targetted specifically towards those interests.
It will be very interesting to see what AOL do with the Bebo brand, as they’ve really failed to deliver anything useful in the ISP stakes over the last few years. I’ve lost count of the customers (mainly home users) over the last few years who I’ve supported and helped with removing AOL due to the software being bloated and about as fun to use as poking yourself in the eye with pins. Likewise, there isn’t a day that goes by without someone spamming me with Bebo invites and telling me to come and share my life with them on yet another social networking site. So with Bebo’s spam and AOL’s awful ISP reputation, I’m predicting that this will now be a ticking timebomb.
What do you think about AOL taking over Bebo? And does anyone have anything nice to say about either brand?
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