The Instapundit - AOL Acquisition

Surprising news flashed across my screen this weekend (links at the conclusion).  If I have this right, and goodness knows I've been wrong before, Glenn Reynolds, the Editor in Chief of the link-feste Instapundit, has made a bid to acquire AOL.

Strange ice, and hot snow, how can this be?  Remember, just over ten years ago AOL purchased TimeWarner in a stock and cash transaction, but that deal quickly went south, with Time spinning off a much reduced AOL.  More recently, AOL bought Huffington Post and that has not been an entirely happy conjunction either, having raised the profile of neither entity.

Let's look at the numbers: AOL, with a market cap of $1.8 billion, is trading at just under $19, and has fluctuated between $22 and $10 over the past twelve months; but if we drill down we see that it is trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 134.46, suggesting a diminutive income stream for a mature, first generation digital business.  We've found no recent statements from the company about a strategy for improving those numbers. 

Instapundit, on the other hand, has always "punched above its weight."  Though it is a closely-held private company, Insta- has a very carefully defined brand, and has featured awesomely robust (for its size) advertising sales courtesy of Amazon.  We understand that Reynolds's fixed costs have been low, aside from a high level of re-investment in technology, so even with the sketchiest of data for that company we can project a very high return on capital for its venture.

Nevertheless, Instapundit would not have cash on hand for so expensive a purchase, so we might surmise that Reynolds has been backed in a (highly) leveraged buy out by a venture capital firm working with a major issuer of corporate paper.  (I have a call into analyst Sidd Finch at the firm of Cerf, Guest & Plimpton for more on this matter.)

Update: in another sector of the media market, N+1 is said to be acquisition mode.

More about the Instapundit - AOL Acquisition here, here and here.  Watch for updates here.

Update 2: Disclosure: The Main Point has received an injection of readership via an Insta-lanche.

Spotted in 75005 Paris

The Essence Seeker Project

Through a friend I came across Andrea Wilson and her Essence Seeker project.  Her project, an on-line collection of tributes, is an ongoing exercise to identify icon people, things, companies, places, and creations, and to explore what it is that makes them unique and essential, what gives them their iconic identity. 

As she herself says:

Essence Seeker pays tribute to people, icons, brands and experiences that are truly original and exceptional, with each distilled into a single image and set of words.  I spend my life searching for the essence – in defining brands for clients, discovering what makes people different or simply experiencing life.  If we know the essence of who we are, we can navigate a complex world and make the most of our existence.  Each tribute is cultivated over time in the hope that it provides something rich to savour.

Below is her tribute to William Blake, an essential English poet who speaks all too directly to this year.

See more Essence Seeker tributes, and subscribe, HERE.

Martyrs' Square, Beirut, 14 February 2009

As the brutal events in Syria stretch on, and the hope for civil society in Egypt remains in question, the Arab Spring is looking more like a winter of discontent.  Whatever emerges from this painful gestation, it’s important to remember that things began in Beirut, in March 2005, with the Cedar Revolution.

In 2009, while in Beirut as part of a press delegation I attended a memorial on February 14th in Place des Martyrs for Rafik Hariri, the Lebanese Prime Minister slain four years before. That day, the memorial became a political rally for the parties who launched the Cedar Revolution. While in Martyr’s Square I interviewed journalists Christopher Hitchens, Lee Smith, as well as a number of Lebanese journalists.  As Hitchens reminded me, it was also the twentieth anniversary of Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa against Salman Rushdie.   

Later that afternoon, Hitchens along with companions Michael Totten and Jonathan Foreman were confronted on a street in the Hamra neighborhood by toughs from the SSNP, who made a point of stomping on the fingers of his right hand.  Later, somewhat recovered, Hitchens commented, “I make it a rule never to pass a swastika without graffitiing upon it.  It can lead to trouble, but it must be done.”

Accounts of that afternoon by Hitchens, Totten, and Foreman, may be found here, here, and here.

I recorded that morning’s events, and these interviews, on a Flip Video Recorder ($85 via Amazon, but now no more), and edited this short video on a MacBook using iMovie software.

Goodbye Winter?

Who says it never snows in London?  We had a bit of it this winter, especially where I am perched at elevation.  But today... though I hate to tempt fate... it feels like spring.  No more of this please.