AOL discovered that dot-coms would pay nearly any price for an advertising deal.

Evidence

Perhaps his gambler’s instinct picked up a tell. When negotiating with a company named Music Boulevard, at the last minute he tore up the price sheet and doubled AOL’s asking rate from 8 million to 16 million. Shockingly, Music Boulevard was still prepared to do the deal. So Berlow upped it again, to $18 million plus a cut of profits. No problem. — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 733

Categorization

• CANDY: A fun, tweetable anecdote: the ad salesman doubling his price twice to $18 million plus profit share with zero resistance.