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back to article AOL buys a friend for $850m

AOL will acquire yoof social networking site Bebo for $850m cash, the web 0.1 mastodon announced today. Bebo has been on the block for months with the web 2.0 circle jerk merrily tossing the names of News Corp, Yahoo!, CBS, Microsoft - basically anyone in online media - around. It's not clear what the deal will mean for Yahoo …

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  1. James
    Alert

    WHY?

    and again WHY?

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  2. JP
    Paris Hilton

    Following on from the Disney article...

    So, the best way to get someone to buy AOL is...

    ... to bloat it up with a has-been social network and lumber it with more debt?

    Yep!

    Right, so I'll express my non-interest to buy AOL as well, thankyouverymuch...

    Paris, because she goes shopping with borrowed money too...

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  3. Duncan Hothersall
    Heart

    Good lord

    AOL yet again jumps onto the crest of a wave which has already crashed onto the beach. The phrase "more money than sense" leaps to mind. Bizarre.

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  4. Anonymous Coward
    Heart

    Re: WHY?

    You're the owner of Bebo. A huge ISP (that's what they are, aren't they?) offers to buy your baby for $850m. Why the hell not?

    You're a huge ISP. You see a chance to get in with the yoofs of today. You offer a large amount of cash in order to stay relevance. The board approves your payrise.

    Everybody wins more internets.

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  5. adnim

    @james

    Users are commodities to be monetised. Need I say more?

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  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Oh, well...

    ...here I am busting my ass in the manufacturing biz, and these guys are getting a billion dollars. Oh well - I'm doing science and I'm still alive...

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  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Desperation

    A desperate attempt to become relevant again...

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  8. Patrick O'Reilly

    About time

    It's about time Bebo got some goddam recognition.

    OK so social networking can be annoying but I like the was Bebo does it.

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  9. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    ...and thrice 'Why?'

    does anyone even use bebo? i though all the cool kids had migrated to facebook

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  10. PeteGraham
    Black Helicopters

    WHY???

    Myarse, faceache and bobies are all shat anyway. I'll keep my friends where I can actually socialise with them, thank you very much.

    Black helicopters cos I'm sure a straggle of the great unwashed will be after me for "dissing" their only social links with civilization

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  11. Sarah Bee (Written by Reg staff)

    Re: WHY???

    I see what you did there!

    I showered this morning, actually. Maybe I should update my status to reflect this.

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  12. DJ_duo
    Heart

    I do

    I use Bebo, it's considerably better for keeping in touch with people you actually know in real life than MySpace or Facebook. Which in my experience often facilitates the need for meeting new people online better.

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  13. Steven Foster
    Thumb Down

    Nice...

    You'd have to pay me that much to want to have anything to do with Bebo.

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  14. Kurt Guntheroth

    web 0.1 mastodon

    Wow, that was perhaps the lowest hit ever for the Register. How do you look at yourself in the mirror? Keep up the good work.

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  15. Chris Williams (Written by Reg staff)

    Re: web 0.1 mastodon

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/02/01/the_color_of_irony/

    That is all.

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  16. david gomm

    a good time to sell

    Nice work by the owners of Bebo for selling almost at the top of the social networking market

    Bad luck AOL it's all downhill from here

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  17. Robert Armstrong
    Happy

    It's official

    Social networking has jumped the shark.

    May Web 2.0 die a slow and painful death!

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  18. Cliff

    Great name-calling

    No, seriously, this is why I pay for the reg.

    Web 0.1 mastadon (fantastic description, describes the situation perfectly)

    circle-jerk (exactly what seems to have been happening)

    tell it like it is, don't be afraid to call a mobe a mobe. Excellent.

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  19. Ralph B

    Fembot?

    > Ex-Google fembot Joanna Shields will continue to run Bebo

    In what way _exactly_ are you saying she resembles the Austin Powers boob shooters? Just in case her lawyers want to take notes ... ?

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  20. Morely Dotes

    Hmmm?

    "Ex-Google fembot Joanna Shields will continue to run Bebo, which is developed in San Francisco"

    Wait, wait... You mean to say someone actually "developed" Bebo? I wasn't just the result of a massive teenage wankfest?

    Lucky buggers probably got paid to do it, too.

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  21. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    And I though Spitzer's prostitue was expensive

    Bebo is apparently a Bimbo.

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  22. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    what a con

    congrats to the bebo owners seriously doing a number on aol it's dumb deals like this that is going to cause the next downturn.

    You just can't fix stupid.

    ah paris.

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  23. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    AOL users and share holders

    OK, instead of hearing the tiresome "You have mail" you will now hear "You've been fucked!"

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  24. Sceptical Bastard

    Old git hangs around the skatepark

    Christ, it's as embarrassing as your grandad trying to gain cred by wearing baggies and talking in slang to skaters.

    One cripple buying another if you ask me.

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  25. Oisin McGuigan
    Alert

    AOL!!!!!

    So let me see. The future of Bebo will be full of useless applications that slow the whole thing down, have loads of really annoying notifications, be ugly, be over restricted and not pay any attention to peoples input (If AOL get their mits on it). So, pretty much Facebook...... Oh, well, Orkut it is then!!!!!

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  26. Sam Kirkpatrick
    Thumb Down

    The AOL Effect

    I recently gave in to the whole social networking thing and set myself up a Bebo profile after a long and vehement refusal to get anywhere near it!

    When I read the first mention of AOL getting their hands on Bebo, I remember a snake-like reaction towards my browser address bar where I started typing "facebo...". Then I caught myself on.

    The fact that I was even _considering_ another social networking profile worried me a lot but it also taught me that AOL has a "run like hell" effect on me whenever their name appears to be even fleetingly associated with anything I use.

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