Why did AOL buy advertising?

7. 2004 -- Moving More Into Media AOL acquires Advertising.com for $435 million in a move to shift its business model from subscription-based to advertising-based. "We intend to play big across the board in all the forms of Internet advertising," then-Chairman and CEO of AOL Jonathan Miller said at the time of the deal.

When did AOL & Time Warner merge?

AOL and Time Warner ( TWX) merge on Jan. 11, 2001 creating AOL Time Warner, celebrated in the photo above by AOL CEO Steve Case (left) and his counterpart at Time Warner, Gerald Levin. The company traded under the ticker "AOL." The deal, valued at $350 billion, created the world's largest media company at the time.

How did AOL acquire CompuServe?

AOL acquires CompuServe 's online service business, then owned by H&R Block ( HRB) , through a complicated transaction with WorldCom. The transaction brought AOL's membership base to nearly 12 million at the time. (Today it is at roughly 200 million, according to the company's Web site.)