So no, I'm not criticizing them for shutting things down. I'm criticizing AOL for a) being unable to actually deliver services that compete with other Web 2.0 companies out there and b) badly mishandling and mismanaging other innovative companies they did acquire and then couldn't do anything with. And for those acquisitions that weren't the fault of mishandling or mismanagement, it's basically damning evidence that AOL was pissing money away and couldn't even judge which companies to acquire.

I don't see any reason to praise AOL for not being able to create or manage these things. And it has cost them millions if not billions of dollars, resulted in thousands of people losing their jobs, etc.

Focus on the successes? Sure. But look at your failures too - see why you failed and try not to repeat it. It's something they haven't shown much capacity to do so far, although fortunately at least AOL no longer seems to be in the business of trying to launch new destined to fail products or acquiring other companies to mismanage into the ground.

...Which is exactly why they have been closed, as mentioned on peopleconnectionblog.com.

What? Are they supposed to keep running a product that didn't take off?

Take your lumps, keep moving, and focus on the things that are working. That is the mentality, and yes, it is working. There will likely be more failures, but success as well.

These are legacy products...just like any other company, some things get shut down to focus on things that have better traction.

For example, check out http://corp.aol.com/mediaglow or google AOL Media glow to see the successes that outnumber the old projects that have been closed. The niche sites are a focus and appear to be working well.

For example, the CircaVie product is now being used on Bebo for user generated photo's to share with their friends.