Laughing All the Way to the Bank
AOL is going to pay $300 million in cash, and $15 million in stock, for the Huffington Post, and Arianna Huffington will become the head of AOL’s media division. The Huffington Post had $31 million in revenue last year and barely made a profit. But if that math doesn’t make sense, consider this:
“This is a statement that the company is making investments, and in this case a bold investment, that fits right into our strategy,” Mr. Armstrong said in an interview Sunday. “I think this is going to be a situation where 1 plus 1 equals 11.”
Ms. Huffington and Mr. Armstrong began discussing the possibility of a sale only last month. They came to know each other well after they both attended a media conference in November and quickly discovered, as Ms. Huffington put it, “we were practically finishing each other’s sentences.” She added: “It was really amazing how aligned our visions were.”
I wonder who will quit first: the unpaid Post writers who aren’t making a dime from this deal, Arianna’s Hollywood buddies, or Arianna herself.
February 7, 2011 7:28 am
Posted in: General Stupidity
46 Comments
46 Responses
stuckinred - February 7, 2011 | 7:34 am · Link
Bobbie sue, whoa, whoa, she slipped away
Billy joe caught up to her the very next day
They got the money, hey
You know they got away
They headed down south and they’re still running today
Singin go on take the money and run
Go on take the money and run
More lyrics: http://www.lyricsfreak.com/s/steve+miller/#share
Sly - February 7, 2011 | 7:35 am · Link
No matter what happens, the health writers will be fine. They’ll just put some pennies in a jug of water, shake it, and then watch as their pocket change turns into millions of dollars through the awesome power of bullshit.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen - February 7, 2011 | 7:41 am · Link
I’m just shocked AOL has that much cash.
salacious crumb - February 7, 2011 | 7:56 am · Link
Arianna for sure. HuffPost was going nowhere, and AOL had already been know for making bad decisions (example AOL-Time Warner). She will cash in and she will be out to make the next trash tabloid posing as liberal journalism
David - February 7, 2011 | 7:58 am · Link
As long as the geniuses who write the headlines designed to entice readers to click on a link concerning a celebrity don’t leave then Huffington Post should be fine.
Alex S. - February 7, 2011 | 8:00 am · Link
I thought that 1 plus 1 makes 10.
So what’s next, Huffpost Corporate Mergers, Huffpost Selling Out or Huffpost Bankruptcy?
jsfox - February 7, 2011 | 8:04 am · Link
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: I doubt they do. The deal will be underwritten and financed by investment bankers.
PurpleGirl - February 7, 2011 | 8:06 am · Link
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: Loans, bonds, whatever. They don’t have the cash, it’s being financed by debt. It’s a fine, traditional American business decision—use debt for “expansion”.
Nicole - February 7, 2011 | 8:07 am · Link
the unpaid Post writers who aren’t making a dime from this deal
Oh, Arianna. Still Republican after all these years.
Nicole - February 7, 2011 | 8:09 am · Link
Formatting wha? Happy Monday to you, too, WP.
A Humble Lurker - February 7, 2011 | 8:15 am · Link
OT
Can we have a thread about what an insufferable moron Bill O’Reilly is, please? His interview with the President is already up on the intertubes and it needs BJ snark to accompany it like cheesy movies need MST3K 3000.
Omnes Omnibus - February 7, 2011 | 8:16 am · Link
@Alex S.: Oooh, a binary joke. Well played.
Suck It Up! - February 7, 2011 | 8:19 am · Link
ugh!
Benjamin Cisco - February 7, 2011 | 8:19 am · Link
Ah, another gastritis victim. Imagine that.
donna - February 7, 2011 | 8:21 am · Link
so now Huffington Post will be even further to the “right?”
rapier - February 7, 2011 | 8:21 am · Link
It’s a slezzy outfit. Maybe half their revenue comes from people paying for AOL dial up access. That would be mainly old people who think they have to pay to keep their membership in AOL and sometimes even the internet, even though most have cable internet.. I knew someone whose father paid thousands for AOL high speed internet even though there is no such thing. The company, such as it is has for years been based upon pure fraud. Their new efforts at creating local content are interesting but the fact is they place is one big crime.
Jack - February 7, 2011 | 8:24 am · Link
@Alex S.: It’s too darn early on a Monday for geek jokes…
:-P
El Tiburon - February 7, 2011 | 8:27 am · Link
AOL? Didn’t they die along with atari? And didn’t they almost kill Time-Warner?
I admit to clicking on Huff-Po but my average stay is about 30 seconds to peruse headlines, I rarely read any stories. Also the boobies.
Shalimar - February 7, 2011 | 8:34 am · Link
I couldn’t get past this poor guy thinking so much like Arianna that he can finish her sentences. I would be contemplating suicide if I ever got that disease.
edited to add:
@El Tiburon: You go to Huffpost for boobies? You know, the internets are a wonderland of boobies. They’re everywhere. You really should find a better source so you get a higher quality product.
Lincolnshire Poacher - February 7, 2011 | 8:46 am · Link
@stuckinred:
In regards to this it shall be sung by Killdozer, For Ladies Only. Here’s to you Arianna.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiUEjG3ddPA
Denise Revis-Martin - February 7, 2011 | 8:50 am · Link
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen:
AOL still receives a significant amount of their revenue from people who are paying AOL for their Internet access.
Surprisingly, many of these people aren’t actually using AOL dial-up. But they mistakenly believe that they have to pay AOL monthly charges to continue to use their @aol.com email address, even though they can readily access their AOL email on the web or through a standard email client.
Sadly, AOL doesn’t tell these people that they don’t need to pay their monthly charges in order to get their email.
As these people become more knowledgeable (or leave the internet), AOL’s revenue will decline, and they won’t be in a position to spend $300 million on deals like this.
Nick - February 7, 2011 | 8:53 am · Link
This is sooooo delicious. After railing about corporate consolidation of the media, she sells her website to…a corporation.
She even slammed AOL last week!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....12307.html
what will emo progressives do now?
This is clearly Obama’s fault.
A Humble Lurker - February 7, 2011 | 8:54 am · Link
@A Humble Lurker:
Damn it. That should just be MST3K. Sorry. But my point still stands.
And Arianna Huffington can suck it. I used to hang out on that site, and while I don’t generally see myself as incredibly perceptive, even I could tell there was something that didn’t smell right about that place. I remember her writing some stupid ass story with the title ‘Middle Class: Obama’s Just Not That Into You’ And she got on TRMS for it. I could have strangled her. Everything else that’s screwed up about that aside, who is this bitch to fashion herself as any kind of expert on the middle class? Sweet Fancy Moses.
The Commenter on BJ formerly known as arguingwithsignposts - February 7, 2011 | 8:55 am · Link
That’s a pretty chunk of change for a place that doesn’t pay its writers. Sharecropping is alive and well!
different church-lady - February 7, 2011 | 9:05 am · Link
Fixed.
rikryah - February 7, 2011 | 9:10 am · Link
this merger needs GOvernment approval, hence the sudden interest in a Black section at Huffington Post.
Poopyman - February 7, 2011 | 9:17 am · Link
Breaking news from HuffPo!
Diesel Spill Outside Whitehouse Gate.
Sigh.
Shalimar - February 7, 2011 | 9:20 am · Link
@rikryah: Whaaaaa?
nepat - February 7, 2011 | 9:25 am · Link
So the Arianna Huffington con is now complete. Pretend to be a liberal who speaks out on behalf of the poor while negotiating multi-million dollar deals for yourself. Remember her anti-SUV crusade when she got busted for traveling all over the place in private jets? And AOL? Really? Someone needs Sean Parker on speed dial.
Odie Hugh Manatee - February 7, 2011 | 9:30 am · Link
AOL thrives on ignorance and stupidity, purchasing HuffPo is perfectly in line with their business model. I just cost them two more customers, both old people who have broadband and thought ‘AOL was the internet’. Both were shocked to learn that they had email addresses at their broadband providers that had email in them both, going went back several years…lol! Now they are happily sailing along online without being boxed in to the ‘AOL part’ of the internet. That and they were surprised to see all of the AOL crap that was eating up a load of system resources and how much their computers ran after purging that crap and the load of adware/spyware on their systems.
Both are conservatives who had to have a liberal pull their heads out of their asses. Ok, I only got them part way out but it’s an improvement!
AOL thrives on ignorance, the HuffPo purchase proves it.
Punchy - February 7, 2011 | 9:33 am · Link
With math skillz like that, I suspect he also thinks this online blog/”news” thang will make him eleventy bagillion ducats and free donuts.
daveNYC - February 7, 2011 | 9:40 am · Link
Actually, that merger was a really good move by AOL. Just think about where they’d be if they hadn’t done the merger (and it was paid for in stock). Time Warner got the shaft on that one.
And a deal like this one will most likely have a clause that Arianna has to stick around for some amount of time post-merger. That’s kind of usual for companies that have a single person who is identified with the brand. It’d be like someone buying Apple, but not making sure that Jobs stays in the house.
If I Understand Correctly : Lawyers, Guns & Money - February 7, 2011 | 9:47 am · Link
[...] this modern version of the AOL/Time Warner merger, AOL is playing the role Time Warner played last time (i.e. older [...]
Svensker - February 7, 2011 | 9:51 am · Link
@Benjamin Cisco:
BJ inside joke win!
Jinchi - February 7, 2011 | 9:51 am · Link
Don’t most situations like that end up with someone going to jail?
xian - February 7, 2011 | 9:52 am · Link
AOL, my employer (though I am not speaking in any official capacity), is putting up $300m in cash, the rest in stock, so no, not a debt-leveraged deal. We actually have a lot of cash on hand, partly from selling off non-core assets, and I think also from the spinoff from Time-Warner.
Nicole - February 7, 2011 | 10:06 am · Link
Well, each side has its grifters. The Right has Palin and we have Huffington. We just insist on ours having a handle on grammar.
Citizen_X - February 7, 2011 | 10:30 am · Link
Well, that’ll fit right in with the rest of the “science” stories on Huffpo.
Erik Vanderhoff - February 7, 2011 | 10:40 am · Link
Wait, people still use AOL?
nepat - February 7, 2011 | 10:43 am · Link
@rikryah:
The new black section I interpreted as more of an attempt to chip away at the core of Obama’s base – something that Huffington, DK, FDL, and the rest of the “progressives” have not been able to effectively do. It will essentially be a news aggregator for anti-Obama voices from the AA community, while providing air cover for charges of racism for the rest of the site.
twiffer - February 7, 2011 | 10:54 am · Link
wait…AOL still exists?
azlib - February 7, 2011 | 11:09 am · Link
Price to earnings ratio of 10-1. Not bad. I suspect Arianna is the one laughing all the way to the bank on this one.
Anton Sirius - February 7, 2011 | 11:42 am · Link
To answer the question: first one out the door was…
Al Giordano
eemom - February 7, 2011 | 12:05 pm · Link
@Anton Sirius:
in contrast, Hamsher lackey Daydee sez it’s all good:
imo, Hamsher would KILL to be bought by the one of the big boys—even the skinny ghost of one like AOL.
different church-lady - February 7, 2011 | 12:42 pm · Link
@Jinchi:
Sadly, I think most of them don’t.
Cris - February 7, 2011 | 12:58 pm · Link
This bears repeating, over and over. Is it surprising that HuffPo is profitable when its primary product is produced by unpaid labor?