America Online, better known as AOL, announced they would lay off about 750 employees. This comes as a response to declining subscriber levels from AOL’s dial-up access service.
The current plan is to close their Orlando, Florida call center as well as reduce numbers at their Jacksonville, Tucson and Dulles facilities. AOL has lost nearly a million subscribers since March and nearly 3 million in the last year. These cuts represent about 4% of their 20,000 global work force. Most of the workers will come out of the Dulles location, their primary facility
The Wall Street Journal quoted AOL spokeman Nicholas J. Graham, “”A lot has changed regarding our membership and access business and we’re managing that transformation.”
AOL has been the center of much scrutiny lately as Time Warner was reported to be in talks with a number of companies about a stake in AOL. Those companies include Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and Comcast. AOL has long been associated with strong original content and that’s what these companies are after.
Back in the day, when AOL was the overwhelming force in internet access, one of the draws were their chat rooms. This social interaction system continues to be their strong suit as AOL keeps its users for 6 hours plus a day. This is what those companies are after and this is what Time Warner is hoping to build on. They will offer more original content and make money on advertising.
John Stith is a staff writer for murdok covering technology and business.
