Monday’s Ramblings

How are your ears? Mine are aching from yet another Super Bowl misstep in the choice of those who sing the “Star Spangled Bummer” to kick off the game. Oh, Christina, it was worse than missing a few words. You sounded like Cher singing in her sleep after taking too many Ambien. In fact, Cher would have been a better choice. Forget her still-decent voice, it’s what she wouldn’t have worn that could have made the pre-kick-off stage the area for the latest wardrobe malfunction. Having that element behind us, the half-time program would have been moot this year – which it was anyway – unless one deems the cold-looking-bulky Sci-Fi attire worn by The Black Eyed Peas and friends a malfunction worse than hearing Fergie sing off key.

Tsk. Some things never change. And then, some things do……

Change has been a–comin’ every which way this year. Apparently the collective consciousness decided to take the turning of the New Year page to heart. Less than two months into 2011, the world has seen revolutions in two government's (Tunisia and Egypt); further meltdowns from two of Hollywood’s loose cannons (Lohan and Sheen); Eminem in a car commercial for the Super Bowl and Detroit in general; Sarah Palin cashing-in on her name to turn into a trademark faster than a gambling junkie on the prowl in Las Vegas with fat pockets; Bill O’Reilly becoming the voice of reason at Fox News (if one ignores his views on the Moon and tides); Keith Olbermann’s exit from MSNBC - and now this: the impending merger of AOL and The Huffington Post that Arianna Huffington announced on her site today. Say what?

Off and running into a corporate alliance, I applaud Arianna and company for their success over the past 5+ years and her media-based savvy by creating a highly informative online “newspaper” that would eventually attract lucrative buyers. However, AOL has been floundering for years and is seen as a very old horse the public sent out to pasture to quietly chomp on what remains of their cyber landscape.

The Huffington Post is indeed a fine acquisition as it ranks #1 on Technorati’s Top Blogs listings as if superglue had been inserted under the HP’s moniker. Arianna wrote a detailed account of what led to this questionable marriage. On the surface, her reasoning for accepting the ring of commitment from the bended knee of AOL Chairman and CEO Tim Armstrong, appears to fit her vision for a broader reach of The Huffington Post. My concern is the taint of yet another corporate buyout of an entity many readers believed to be reasonably pure of more than Groupon and numerous how to lose body fat ads.

I wonder what Tina Brown would do if Yahoo offered to buy The Daily Beast? Yes, Yahoo. Remember them? If a mass exodus of The Huffington Post readers actually occurs per numerous comments on that site today, The Daily Beast may just live up to its name and scarf-up the leftovers.

(Thanks to an astute reader's comment, I will mention that in November, 2010, Newsweek and The Daily Beast merged in a 50-50 venture. Yahoo was an example of an online entity of little power.)