AOL loses Calacanis: You’ve Got Bail |
Loading ...I’ve been waiting for confirmation from the bulldog’s mouth regarding whether or not Jason Calacanis was leaving AOL. When it comes to AOL though, it seems more like getting a get out of jail free card in Monopoly. Just ask Vincent Ferrari who enjoyed 15 minutes of fame for recording his frustrating attempt to eject.
The never boring Calacanis promised to add more details to the last Gillmor Gang podcast, but puts in a little bit of why he left in a blog post and his comments area:
I wanted to put a year into AOL and see how far I could take it. It’s now exactly a year and I’m excited about how far we took everything.
What was the over/under on how long he’d last at AOL? I remember saying somewhere he wouldn’t last more than 12-18 months but finding that post here is escaping me at the moment. Must be among the 39 odd “Calacanis” related posts.
Whatever the case, Jason’s crowning achievement at AOL will be remembered as building a Digg-clone at Netscape and trying to lure away the top Digg submitters by paying them for their efforts. He might be excited about how far they took everything but I’ve heard very little positive about Netscape since the changeover. He gets major points though for getting people to talk about a website for a browser that most of us abandoned in the 90s.
Best of luck to Jason in his next venture which, considering his track record, will last about 1-2 years. Expect him to contine to be exactly as (at one time) competing publisher Nick Denton writes at Valleywag:
He’ll be loud, infuriating — and probably, irritatingly, successful.
But Jason isn’t the first AOL casualty. His timing conveniently following AOL CEO Jon Miller who Jason referred to as his mentor. Wow, I learn something new every day, I though his mentor was his bulldog? 
“I’m not inclined to start over with a new guy,” Mr. Calacanis said in an interview on Thursday. As for what to make of the treatment of Mr. Miller, who discovered he was being replaced after a reporter called AOL asking about Mr. Falco’s appointment, Mr. Calacanis said only: “I’m perplexed. Why now?”
All kidding aside, good luck in your next venture, Jason. We may not always see eye to eye but I think Calacanis is very talented at stirring up the dust and surrounding himself with good, hard working people.
The Inquirer wonders what’s next for Netscape? I’d give it less than a year before the Netscape digg-clone project is scrapped and many of those good people Jason took with him are looking for new jobs. Maybe at whatever Jason decides to start/do next? I could certainly be wrong and Netscape will continue to flourish as a Digg-clone. What do you think will happen to Netscape?
Related Posts- Calacanis plays limp personal attack card against Kevin Rose
- Slashdot Firehose brings readers into story selection process a la digg
- Sure, I’ll “keep hating” the new Netscape search, Jason
- New Netscape.com righteous or ripoff of Digg debate begins
- Digg clone spotted: Wobble
- One week of paint on new Netscape beta, Digg still the big story
I agree with your prediction. Unless Netscape does something to differentiate themselves in a positive way, they are just a “me too” with a “once was” name.
Comment by Sterling Camden — November 17, 2006 @ 3:48 pm PST
“You’ve got bail” … best title so far in this meme.
Comment by Sterling Camden — November 17, 2006 @ 3:49 pm PST
Maybe somebody will tweak the audio for that familiar mail message
This latest management musical chairs could become AOL’s dying gasp as they finally get assimilated by somebody else (Microsoft? Yahoo? Google?). The only thing good AOL has going for it IMHO is their content. If they don’t find some viable way to highlight and promote that content to the rest of the world, they’re done. The dialup ISP business is fading fast.
Comment by TDavid — November 17, 2006 @ 4:05 pm PST
If I were Time-Warner, I’d be looking to shake AOL off like a bad cold. ISP, Search, E-mail, chat, and Digg-clone. Only the chat is first-rate, everything else is second best or worse. Or am I missing something?
Comment by Sterling Camden — November 17, 2006 @ 4:59 pm PST
There are — or at least were — some outstanding speciality content areas on AOL like the keyword: novel area which a long time ago I spent a lot of time visiting and enjoying. Not of wide interest perhaps to people not interested in reading fiction (not sure where you fall on that one, Sterling), but there aren’t a huge amount of outstanding weekly fiction contest sites on the web. At least there weren’t in the mid to late nineties, maybe there are tons of them now.
I understand from the time I worked (volunteer who got a comped AOL account) that other areas unrelated to writers and writing had equal interest and good to great content. Most of that was never archived or searchable thanks to AOL’s walled garden which has really hurt them over the years in being recognized beyond their own member base. I thought AOL was making it so that content would be allowed to be searched and reviewed by non-paying members, but maybe that hasn’t happened yet? I’m a little reluctanct to install AOL’s client on any of our machines, even if it is free these days just to find out. It’s been too much hassle getting out of their stuff
I have mostly fond memories of AOL content areas, but the exact opposite with their software.
Comment by TDavid — November 17, 2006 @ 7:35 pm PST
Thankfully I never signed up for AOL (though I did get a free e-mail account the other day just to diagnose something — made me feel dirty). I used Prodigy back in the early 90’s. When the web came, I just jumped into Netscape (ha!) and never gave AOL another look. Too many horror stories from people who went down that path and never escaped. It would be cool if they would share access to their walled content, if they’ve built some value there.
Comment by Sterling Camden — November 17, 2006 @ 7:43 pm PST
Great Follow-Up, Nice Depth In Your Story…
AOL jumped on a merry-go round it now cannot get off !
(Calacanis)has great talent and intentions though, Just forgot who he was working for…
Comment by Anthony Paul — November 18, 2006 @ 12:26 pm PST