Google has apparently won the battle to retain AOL’s affections, edging out a bid from Microsoft. But the cost is high, and establishes several precedents for the Mountain View company that might have been unthinkable a couple of years ago.
While AOL’s parent Time Warner has yet to make a public statement, published reports claim that Google has paid $1 billion to take a 5 per cent stake in the media giant. AOL’s sales team gets access to the Google Network, and Google will also give Time Warner’s media properties preferential treatment:
Click Here“Google, which prides itself on the purity of its search results, agreed to give favored placement to content from AOL throughout its site, something it has never done before,” reports the New York Times.
Wow…so long the good ol’ days of a search engine that is just focused on providing the most accurate and most relevant results. Say hello to the new Google. A Google where you get search results primarily from whomever they have ties to. Wow, I’m excited, aren’t you?
Wandering the Interwebs 