AOL was a little light on the top line but made it up on the cost line. There were no surprises based on what we heard on Jan. 7.

At the top of the cycle you write [policies for] everybody, no matter how bad, and at the bottom you cancel everybody, no matter how good. It's a manic-depressive cycle.

We already assume we have competitive products. But then there's our top line revenue, margin expenses, cost structure, and if we manage those right, we will yield greater (profit) margins.

If AOL or another ISP decides that someone's a spammer, then no e-mail from that individual gets through. But there's a fundamental difficulty at the heart of the spam debate: The only one who knows what you want delivered in your inbox is you.

It's breathtaking to me that two light poles can cost $135,000.

This is yet another example of how AOL is becoming a company that's all about broadband. There's no question that all the forecasts point to the dial-up subscriber count decreasing in the next few years. AOL understands that.