Home / News & Commentary /
Juno Plays I Spy With WorldSpy
Online service provider Juno will be taking in as many as 260,000 WorldSpy.com accounts that were left without access when the company ceased its free Internet service last week. For subscribers it's yet another lesson that there is no free lunch.
By
Rick Aristotle Munarriz (TMF Edible)
July 6, 2000
[revised July 7, 2000]
WorldySpy homeless -- Juno (Nasdaq: JWEB) wants to offer you shelter! As the troubled upstart closes shop, Juno will be paying the company in stock for members who had used the WorldSpy service and now aspire to live the life of a double agent by switching to Juno.
WorldSpy.com blazed onto the scene last year as yet another player offering free online access. In the span of eight months, 260,000 Internet users took the company up on the offer. The WorldSpy name conjured the global elements of espionage. So, it should come as no surprise that, just last week, the phone lines were cut.
In the world of free online access, one thing is clear -- you get what you pay for. From multimedia Kmart (NYSE: KM) spots at the start of BlueLight.com sessions to the perpetual advertising bar that aims to distract the NetZero.com citizens, being free isn't all it's cracked up to be. The experience makes it hard to focus on the task at hand -- and I'm not talking about the consumers anymore.
Ad-subsidized providers (including the players like AllAdvantage that pay users $0.40-$0.60 an hour to surf the Net as they stream banner ads) are getting hit from both sides. A once hot Wall Street running tepid on tech stocks has soured on the once acceptable concept of printing stock certificates to offset operating losses in the name of customer acquisition. Meanwhile, online retailers scaling back on their marketing efforts have narrowed the list of sponsors willing to pay for the eyeballs of spendthrifts and cheapskates.
Shares of Juno, which traded as high as $86 3/4 back in December, are now trading below their $13 Initial Public Offering price of May 1999.
Juno was a pioneer in the online freebie market. Back when everyone had to pay for personal online access, the company launched a free e-mail only service. It spawned the multimedia onslaught of marketing-fueled free services today.
Juno has since evolved. It has gone on to offer low-cost access that is light on the frills and sponsor bars for its users who want to step it up a notch. In sum, Juno's three million subscribers pale in comparison to the 25 million America Online (NYSE: AOL) has signed up through AOL and its CompuServe offerings. Juno comes in third behind EarthLink (Nasdaq: ELNK), and the WorldSpy defections won't change that.
How will things work behind enemy lines? Users making the move to Juno will be able to keep their WorldSpy.com e-mail addresses. As cruel medicine torture for the captured WorldSpy itself -- it will receive Juno shares for those members who do come to Juno. Hopefully it won't have to scribble "Uncle" on the newly issued certificates. Then again, they say all is fair in love and war.
Your Turn:
React to the news on the Juno discussion board.
Related Links:
Juno Website
Feedback about News & Commentary? Please send mail to
news@fool.com.
