I remember there was this company that had exclusive deals with content providers, in the early Web days. Oh - AOL - that was it. In fact I think I still have o

I remember there was this company that had exclusive deals with content providers, in the early Web days. Oh - AOL - that was it. In fact I think I still have one of their CDs lying around somewhere. I remember Scientific American being behind the AOL-wall, and thinking damn, SA should really be out here with everything else. But I also remember thinking there's no way I'm going to pay AOL for anything when there's so much else out here beyond the walls. And that was in the early Web days. Today I can't believe that anyone would disassociate themselves from the World Wide Web, when virtually every potentially walled-off property has fistfuls of just as good competition out here. Maybe with Bing it won't matter so much, as any browser can display results from multiple engines with the right add-on, or anyone can provide a web-app to do so. So the only people who will care about how this plays out is MS and Google; the rest of us will continue to just search and consume. Murdoch's flirtation with building a giant tree-fort (NO GURLZ ALOWD!) will probably end up being an example of a doomed Maginot Line. "Rumble-rumble-rumble ... What's this? (It's a pay-wall, sir) Well, drive around it!" I think, though, the most comprehensive attempt at re-enacting AOL is FaceBook. Sure, lots of people are in FaceBook, just like all our grandparents were. But there's still a lot of people outside of FaceBook, and anyone selling or renting content inside FaceBook isn't reaching any of those outsiders. And there's plenty outside the FaceBook wall to keep people busy and happy and informed (and blissfully un-poked).