Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[Smart_Money]

Bill Gates Targets AOL

Bill Gates has vowed to destroy AOL.

That's what an insider close to AOL Time Warner tells NewsMax, explaining its recent woes and barrage of negative press coverage.

AOL Time Warner has taken a pummeling in share value, though its stock price is up almost 100% from its recent bottom of $8 a share.

Still, execs at AOL Time Warner say most of their woes and negative press coverage has been manipulated by Bill Gates and Microsoft.

Gates is said to still be furious with AOL Time Warner Chairman Steve Case, who had AOL work up front during the Justice Dept. effort to break up Microsoft.

During the Microsoft break-up proceedings, Case and AOL told the court that it chose Microsoft's browser over rival Netscape because of Microsoft's market dominance - a factor that gave weight to government arguments Microsoft had a virtual monopoly in operating systems for computers and the Web.

Since then Gates has vowed to bring down AOL and destroy it.

The AOL insider tells NewsMax that Microsoft basically "owns the Wall Street Journal" because of its heavy ad spending, and explains why the paper and other media outlets have targeted AOL Time Warner.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/11/30/154225.shtml