Funmurphys: the Blog

Steve Case Leaves AOL

Steve Case has apparently left AOL Time Warner of his own free will. There are a lot of people who dislike Case and AOL, but I'm not one of them. I joined in 1991 (give or take, the memory grows hazy with time) and left only recently to go to broadband when Charter made me a deal I couldn't refuse. I was dissatisfied with AOL when I left, but after our long association, I was more sad than upset. And I think the AOL Time Warner merger was ego in search of justification, and Case got in over his head. Kind of like HP merging with Compaq, but that's another story. Also like a lot of us who thought we were pretty savvy investors, but discovered a rising tide lifts all boats. I have a similar discussion with my brother (who works for Cisco) about the evaluation of management when a market is growing at 30% or more a year -- how do you tell the great from the ordinary? You can't, everybody looks great. I think a lot of the internet hype will eventually come true, just not as soon or by the then players.

When I first signed up, few people would have thought AOL would turn out to be the largest ISP -- heck, it was a dial up service and there weren't any ISPs then. I think the interesting thing is that in those days, AOL was quite Mac like. Not only the interface, but the focus on the customer experience. I considered CompuServe, which was the leader, but between a notoriously awful interface and high prices I went with GEnie instead. But GEnie was cheap for a reason. So then I saw an ad for AOL, and I decided to give it a try. The user experience did deteriorate with time, and the porn spam got to be downright scary in quantity (It was amazing how many mega babes I was getting all hot and bothered). But in the early days, it offered plenty of product, a simple and usable interface at a reasonable cost.

In my opinion, when PCs got big, Microsoft wound up grabbing IBM's monopoly via the IBM compatable route (Yes Virginia, IBM was a monopoly, and Microsoft is a monopoly). Apple lost out in the enterprise market because IBM was nowhere associated with it. For the BBS's, dialups and then ISPs, there was no prior monopoly leader, and AOL won based on user experience, which the home market was sensitive to. Same strategy, different results.

Steve Case did an admirable job at growing a dial up service, at transitioning to an ISP, and in getting ISP customers. But when it came to running a giant ISP, he wasn't as good. And it turns out he wasn't any good at all at running a media giant, but I'm not sure Time Warner has had good management for some time. Somehow I can't find it in my heart to hate or consider evil businessmen who's sin is not doing a good job, or losing sight of the customer. That makes them a lousy businessman, not a lousy person.