AOL Turns 25

Denouement
Unfortunately for the two companies, the tremendous profits envisioned by the merger did not materialize. Analysts point to several reasons: First, the dot com bubble burst and online advertising began to fall, making it difficult for AOL to hit the numbers that the deal was based on. Second, the two companies had very different ideas of what their mutual future would look like. It did not help that the SEC began an investigation in 2002 into what it said were AOL's improper for accounting for its advertising revenue. In the years after the deal, AOL's stock price and subscriber base sank dramatically.

• A Brief History of the Computer