A resurrection for the AOL brand?

As the 'Superbad' character McLovin taught us, a name change can make all the difference.

(Credit: Columbia Pictures)

It's out with the not-so-old and in with the new for AOL CEO Tim Armstrong as he commemorates 100 days at the helm of the dot-conglomerate. Less than a year after AOL launched a new brand called "MediaGlow to encompass all its publishing properties, the company is getting rid of the name and reestablishing it as the far less cute "AOL Media." The company's advertising division, Platform-A, is now "AOL Advertising."

And the properties grouped into the "People Networks" division that was established when AOL acquired social network Bebo (for way too much money) will be worked into three new divisions: AOL Communication, AOL Local and Mapping, and AOL Ventures.

The announcements were made at the latest stop for the "100 Days of Tim Armstrong" party train, a company "revival" meeting in a massive air-conditioned tent (yes, like an evangelical preacher, Tim Armstrong threw a tent revival) in which employees were encouraged to post to Twitter about the goings-on and tag it all with #aol100.

Business Insider was watching the tweets roll in, and picked up on Armstrong's announcement of the division name changes.

But on a more serious note, this does represent a strategic shift in direction for AOL, at least on the marketing front. Brands like Platform-A and MediaGlow seemed to consciously avoid the AOL moniker, which still hasn't shaken off the connotations of late-'90s dial-up access. Armstrong, it appears, believes that keeping "AOL" in there will actually make things stronger--he comes, after all, from Google, which proudly displays its primary-colored logo on virtually all of its properties. At the very least, it'll express a bit more internal faith in the viability of the AOL brand.

Maybe they can do a "you've got mail" mashup remix while they're at it.

UPDATE at 5:21 p.m. PT: Reader David Montgomery made some hilarious art for the occasion, inspired by the poster for the new movie "500 Days of Summer":

(Credit: David Montgomery)

[cvaldes1831]

Jesus, why don't they freakin' just use Netscape? That's a far more descriptive and topical brand than anything else they've concocted or owned.

Idiots.

[Orion Blastar]

AOL by any other name would be just as "fail".

AOL has a lot of debt to deal with, plus a bad image as well.

They should have stuck to things that worked like the Netscape web browser, and the Netscape server software, etc. But instead they threw the baby out with the bath water.

Gag, AOL Media, I guess Youtube was already taken, eh? :)

[JohnBarbagallo]

I think AOL will pull through. You'll all be surprised.

[naterandrews]

Anyone remember the horrible tech company GoldStar? Low end electronics and brand image to boot. Now, fast forward and we now have Vizio, the largest HDTV maker in North America. Companies can successfully reimage themselves if done properly.

[naterandrews]

Pardon my lapse of intelligence; I mean't LG.

[windooor7]

I belive in resurrection and Incarnation. but, lets go with incarnation. where you come back as something else. rather than your old self you cant link old and new with assignment operator.same thing. they need to come back as music online store and maybe think of a social site with heavy ads. under 23s love aol.and all they do is buy musical day from itunes.

[blusky08]

What does AOL do again and why are they still existing?

[SNOOP_ROCA]

MCLOVIN!!!!

[danielszabo1981]

Timebomb.

[kev100--2008]

Gotta Love those CD's

I hope this means they'll start filling up mailboxes again and being stacked up at the post office Wal-Mart check lanes.

I have one more wall to decorate.

[Michichael]

I find AOL to be incredibly useful. You see, as long as AOL is around, that means there is still a large group of people stupid enough to be paying AOL. When AOL dies, it will be a sign that the stupidity we all know and love is evolving.

[ChukchansiDan]

As a former AOL employee, I remember when they were flooding the world with CD's, and gaining so many members, hundreds of thousands of people were constantly having trouble logging on, because they advertised to strongly, they didn't have the infrastructure to keep up with it all.

People were so into their AOL, they started threatening AOL employees.

It was so serious, it became company policy that *no* AOL employee, no matter what their job title (even the janitors, groundskeepers, etc) were allowed to publish their personal phone numbers in phone books, or anywhere else). If your phone company charged you to keep your number out of the book, you got reimbursed.

Now that's some serious devotion... But I agree, AOL made some big mistakes out there (Buying Time Warner being the biggest, IMHO).