On Monday, AOL announced that it will be purchasing Huffington Post for $315 million. This raised many immediate questions. The first question is whether or not Huffington Post is worth that much money. $315 is three times the net-worth the company was ascribed over a year ago. So why would AOL pay so much? The answer is that AOL has struggled to be a ‘content’ website for some time, so what better way to bolster your content than to purchase a company that is PRIMARILY an online content website. And a highly effective content website for that matter.
The co-founder of Huffington Post, Arianna Huffington, gets a lot out of this merger. She will become the editor and chief of all AOL content and will be able to introduce Huffington Post to a whole new world of potential readers. This is a win-win situation for her and her company.
Since Arianna’s company has worked primarily as a liberal news machine and AOL strives to be non-partisan, the biggest questions to come involve the compromise between these ideologies. Will AOL move more liberal? Or will Huffington Post have to adapt. This will be an interesting question to follow into the future.
I can't help but feel a twinge of sadness at this news. Now the premiere independent, left-of-center news and commentary site on the web is going to be owned by a subsidiary of Time-Warner. No doubt, Arianna will work to maintain its editorial independence. But, down the line, I foresee problems. It is never good when fewer companies gobble up control of more of our media universe.
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