16
November
2006
|
10:46 AM
America/Los_Angeles

11.16.06: Shakeups at AOL

Following the ouster of Jon Miller (who is Lou Reed's "kung-fu brother"), Jason Calcanis is also out at AOL.
Here's Om:


An anonymous tip dropped into our inbox, claiming that Jason Calacanis, one of the co-founders of Weblogs Inc., and architect of the new Netscape has resigned from AOL, following the1 resignation of Jon Miller.


On his blog, Jason says no comment2. When we IMed him, he offered the same, No Comment. If the news is indeed true - we are still trying to nail down the details - then AOL might have lost one of the handful of people who were outspoken enough to shake AOL from its polite slumbering ways. Not many saw eye-to-eye with Jason, but most agreed that his heart was in the right place.


On the ouster of Miller, we are as confounded as you are. Falco, despite his resume3, isn’t the kind of executive you would put in charge when your main rival is someone as nimble as Google, or as cash rich as Microsoft or as dogmatic as Yahoo. Sudden executive changes when a company is in transition to a new free model can cause anxiety amongst rank-and-file.


Falco’s appointment is another proof of the bumbling ways of Time Warner, a company known to have the uncanny ability to turn a pot of gold into a bucket of mud water. On a side note, just wondering how the great Time Warner movie machine is doing these days in terms of profits.