AOL Invests $100M In Amazon

jeffsenter writes "AOL is investing 100M USD in Amazon. CNET story. AOL and Amazon began partnering in 1997. AOL plans to integrate Amazon into its shopping channels further and Amazon will promote AOL as its exclusive ISP. The deal did not include purchases of advertising by Amazon from AOL as many such partnerships do." The money part I'm actually not that interested in - what I do think is interesting that given AOL's size and mass, the partnership of they and Amazon is going to be a pivotal one, complimenting each other very well.

Comments

Excellent. Here's why.

[IGnatius T Foobar]

Despite the fact that some people here don't like AOL, this is good news... and here's why.

Amazon is a very high profile e-commerce site. People pay attention to what Amazon is doing... both technology people and business people. Amazon is perceived as a leader. And now that they're hooked up with AOL, the 'leader' will most certainly not become a Passport/Hailstorm site.

I've seen signs of an AOL/Netscape equivalent to that, actually. I'd be happy to see Amazon be part of that family. Not because I'd use it (I wouldn't), but because it would establish that Passport isn't the only game in town. Web sites could end up offering their users a choice of centralized authentication/payment services, much like you can walk into any store and pay with your choice of major credit cards today. Imagine: "We accept Microsoft Passport, AOL [whatever], GNU [whatever], or self pay..."

That's where I want to go today.
--

1 Click

[wangi]

What we're going to be doing at Shop@AOL now is combining a lot of elements of Amazon's shopping platform to enhance the experience of the users of Shop@AOL

So they're getting '1 Click Shopping' then?

Rather confused why Amazon would want AOL search technology too - it's search facilities are the best of the online book stores...

Re:my compliments to the author!

[BilldaCat]

what? an editorial error on slashdot? surely, you just.

hey.. with fantasy football season just around the corner, this has got me thinking.. how about fantasy slashdot?

All grammatical errors: 3 points
All spelling errors: 2 points
Forgetting to close the italic tag: 5 points
Smart-ass comments from the author in the story: 5 points
Using the l key to symbolize the number 1: 5 points
Improper abbreviations: 2 points

Bonuses:

Jon Katz posts an article of less than 3 paragraphs: 20 points
Your author actually comments in a story: 10 points

I'll take CmdrTaco .. of course, that's kinda like fantasy golf, whoever picks Tiger Woods wins...

100M means more than it used to

[mac123]

18 months ago, when AMZN was over 100, this would have meant a tiny fraction of the company.

Now with the market cap under 6B, it means a whole lot more.

18 months ago, the same stake would have cost ~$700M!

That was insightful?

[adubey]

Pray tell, how is buying a stake in a company that is pegged to go under anti-competitive?

Name something AOL doesn't have a stake in...

[kaiidth]

AOL-Time Warner have interesting business habits... in the last couple of months, their assimilation's been looking like this:

• Online music and Internet radio
  
• Partner with Bertelsmann AG, EMI, and RealNetworks for MusicNet
  
• A bunch of other usual suspect movie studios like Universal Pictures, who basically have to pay AOL-Time Warner for advertising airtime (although of course they're associated with Vivendi which probably means they have power all to their own)
• Books- AOL have $100 million in Amazon...
• Advertising- they're the US's second-largest advertiser, apparently.
• Truly awful television (Popstars 2 out this fall)
• Cisco, Swatch and Oxygen (marketing alliances)
• Magazine publishing (UK publisher IPC acquired for 1.1 billion UKP)
  
• EarthLink high-speed cable, Juno and High Speed Access on their broadband systems...
• The subscription video-on-demand market in Columbia, SC (with HBO)
  
• Grab the set-top box market with AOLTV/TiVo(TM)
  
• Oh, and a bunch of US magazines, obviously
• Your local supermarket (over 12,000 retail outlets have apparently signed distribution agreements to promote AOL... including Wal-Mart...)
  
• There's even an AOL mobile service...
  
• A strategic alliance with Sony for the PlayStation 2 (so you can use Instant Messenger, if it ever actually works)
  
• Chinese top computer maker Legend (joint venture)
• and a whole bunch of other stuff, including sponsoring Madonna's latest world tour...

But then, their financial report for the second quarter of '01 claims that they're intending to "expand agressively", and see themselves as "The world's first internet-powered media and communications company, whose industry-leading businesses include interactive services, cable systems, publishing, music, networks and filmed entertainment".

Oh, apparently AOL 7.0 will offer a new level of convenience, ease of use and other marketdroid speak that will make the service "central to members' lives". Can't wait.

What, no Linux version? Darn. Looks like I'll have to after all.

The future...

[rneches]

AOL Time Warner CNN General Motors Ford AT&T Glaxo Smithkline Beecham Amazon Sony Adobe ExxonMobile Texaco Chase Manhattan Hathaway Newport News Inc. (popularly known as Mega-Corp) has announced that it has declared that its rival, Microsoft Daimler Chrisler American Home Products Catapillar BP ABCDisney Barns and Noble Fox Viacom Novartis Boeing CitiGroup Lockheed ADM Sunoco John Deere Enron Apple Gerber A.G. (also known as The Conglomerate) is illegal. The bombing will begin in five minutes.

Just what America needs. Zibatsu.

--

This is bad analysis

[Ars-Fartsica]

Firstly, click here for actual quarterly numbers from AOL.

Secondly, there was never any expectation that AOL would not show a loss within one year after one of the largest mergers in history.

TW ad revenues are up (when most other ad supported businesses are sucking), AOL has sewn up the consumer ISP market, and through partnerships continues to acquire vast swaths of the consumer landscape.

It doens't take a rocket scientist to figure out that over time this will translate into an incredible amount of control and obscene profit margins.

As for you "never owning a stock" - don't brag about that too much, even in days like this, stocks are still your best way to make money (yes kids, Priceline is up 400% in the last couple of months). Take on some risk man, you could get hit by a cement truck tomorrow.

Marketing Systems

[Alien54]

I can see this as being the basis for the next big leap forawrd in computer technologies:

Marketing Systems (as opposed to Operating Systems)

Marketing Systems are systems designed purely for marketing purposes, with operations being hardly even secondary considerations.

We have seen the gradual development of this type of thing with Microsoft. AOL and Amazon have the capabilities to really bring it to maturity.

Check out the Vinny the Vampire comic strip

$100M = 2 months of losses

[sstammer]

So that should last Amazon about 2 months to pay for their losses ($168M for the last quarter).

Hmmm..

[baptiste]

Hey - at least AOL knows what they have is pretty lame and they are going to get the technology to improve their shopping services - at least they chose a decent company - the trouble I see is if AOL decides to exert more influence and buy more of Amazon - I mean, its scary teh subtle changes you see. Once the Time/Warner - AOL deal was done, I was amazed at how the numerous "go to URL xyz.time.com to chat/read more/post, etc" that were at teh end of each TIME magazine article quickly disappeared and were replaced by just AOL keywords - which doesn't do me squat. Personally I think that they are hurting themselves. Not all TIME subscribers are AOL members - if they think stuff like that is gonna force me to be one - ha - not likely. I thought TIME was doing a good job trying to integrate their Internet properties with teh maagzine - now its all AOLacized which is sad.

But such is life. Same goes for CNN, I think it has changed drastically and not for the better. It used to be a hefty site with lots of goodies and tons of links on teh main page. The 'new look' feels to AOLacized - simpler, lots of flashy color backgrounds, and MUCH fewer links to choose from. That and it seems like the news quality and quantity of news reports has decreased. Again - a shame.

So while this investment isn't AOL buying Amazon, if they ever do, I shudder to think what will happen as AOL 'simplifies' the look and feel of Amazon, reducing its usability that so many have come to enjoy

complimenting each other very well.

[CrackElf]

I agree with this prognosis, since they both base their business on ripping off the less intelligent.
-CrackElf