Word: warner
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...well suited by experience and temperament: the good-humored, diplomatic Parsons at the helm; the disciplined, hard-driving Pittman in the engine room. It also represents Levin's parting imprint on the culture of the merged company. And it has investors wondering how Parsons will lead AOL Time Warner, which has lost much credibility for clinging too long to unrealistic promises about how much it can earn in a sagging economy...
Parsons' rise would have been hard to predict back in May 2000, when the executive positions for the newly merged AOL Time Warner were announced. He and Pittman were given the same title, but it was Pittman who got the plum assignments. Subscriptions were seen as the future of the company, and the divisions that relied on them--the AOL online service, cable TV, the Time Inc. magazines--reported to Pittman. Parsons got divisions, like books, music and movies, that customers bought on an old-fashioned per-use basis. He has since worked on President Bush's Commission to Strengthen...
...ambassadorial skills and government contacts may be just what AOL Time Warner needs. To succeed, the company has to forge corporate alliances and persuade regulators around the world to take its side on everything from antitrust questions to e-commerce taxes...
Pittman and Parsons will now have to work as a team even more than they did when they shared a title. AOL Time Warner's media holdings are simply too vast and diverse for any one person to run. "This is the new format for corporate leadership, and we may be on the edge of that," says board member Fay Vincent...
...merger has gone off with surprising smoothness, but old Time Warner hands have occasionally bristled at their AOL colleagues. "Some people in the company felt like the brash new kids from Dulles were coming in, overriding our borders and changing our culture," says Parsons. One continuing concern is whether AOL Time Warner will respect the editorial integrity of CNN and the Time Inc. magazines and fund them adequately. Levin, who often invokes TIME magazine founder Henry Luce, says he regards Parsons as someone who has "the Lucean thing about journalistic independence...