From...

by Bernhard Warner

(IDG) -- Robert DeLena's hobby is giving him nothing but grief. A college psychology professor, the Bronx native has run a side business on America Online for the past four years. The effort, dubbed the Other Side of Creativity, which he incorporated a year ago, doesn't bring him a dime – unless you count the $22-a-month subscription that's free to all AOL volunteers. Still, he puts 40 hours a week into OSC – sometimes more. And for all that work his labor of love has attracted thousands of aspiring and published authors, including best-selling writers Kelsey Roberts and Steven Gaines, who trade advice on everything from getting published to developing a believable protagonist.

OSC has also attracted another kind of attention. During the past four months, DeLena has been embroiled in a dispute with AOL – his landlord, as he calls it. AOL, he claims, is trying to drive him out and take over OSC for itself. Last week, his biggest fear came true: AOL stripped him of his community leader title. OSC is still intact on AOL, but DeLena, according to the company, cannot function as president.

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Why would AOL want to seize control of a writers' workshop? "My feeling in my gut is that they believe if they get rid of me then the [OSC members] will follow them," an exasperated DeLena says.With DeLena out of the picture and AOL in control, DeLena believes, the company will turn OSC into one of the service's many corporate-sponsored areas, or channels.

DeLena's conspiracy theory has some basis in precedent. AOL's meteoric growth has captured the imagination of advertisers. Now, any area of AOL that caters to special interests and draws a large, loyal following is in play. Virtually every AOL channel from health to sports has grown out of these communities and, in the process, AOL has commercialized what was once a grassroots, decidedly uncommercial corner of its service. DeLena believes OSC is next.

AOL dismisses DeLena's accusations. Wendy Goldberg, an AOL spokeswoman, says DeLena has no claim to the OSC community other than the "OSC" trademark. Furthermore, Goldberg says, AOL has no intention of trying to assume control of OSC, nor any of the other 75 profession-specific communities on AOL's Workplace Channel. Goldberg says it's just a misunderstanding: AOL is in the process of moving roughly 15 communities like OSC from its proprietary service to the Web to ease the burden of hosting these areas on its servers. When the transition is complete in February, OSC will operate as it always has, Goldberg says.

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DeLena fears that putting OSC on the Web will result in mass defections. Some members fear that AOL will then swoop in and organize its own writers' section and look for a corporate sponsor. "It reminds me a great deal of a landlord coming up to you and saying, 'We own the apartment and all the furniture,'" says Brandy Walton, a published poet and cofounder of OSC. A longtime AOL subscriber, she points to another member-founded community, the Cooking Club; when that area became popular, AOL pulled its support and replaced it with a corporate-sponsored area.

"They've been clearing out the old partners across the board and going with large corporations," charges Liz Waters, the founder of the Cooking Club. For a period of more than 10 years, Waters was under contract with AOL to run the cooking area. She was let go from AOL in June when the company refused to renegotiate with her. Waters was a special case; she got paid while most other community leaders are simply comped their subscription fee.

The Cooking Club (which Waters incorporated) is no longer on AOL; it is successfully operating on the Web now. But the Food section on AOL has become, by all accounts, very popular, especially since the Cooking Club folded. And it's brimming with advertisers ranging from Kraft to Better Homes & Gardens. "It's good business, isn't it?" Waters asks sarcastically.

Goldberg maintains that corporate-sponsored areas like Food are born on AOL because users clamor for subject matter that only corporations or publishers can provide. "If members say, 'We love cooking. Can you bring us Kraft recipes?' We're going to do it," she says. "The mass market is coming on in droves. They enjoy these kinds of things."

But DeLena believes AOL doesn't have the right to force the OSC transition onto the Web. He says he negotiated with AOL a year ago to keep OSC on the AOL proprietary service. The deal, according to DeLena, hinged on an agreement that he and his volunteers would use OSC to attract traffic to AOL's anemic Writing and Publishing section, of which OSC is a subsection. For the past year, DeLena says he has spent his days organizing, promoting and supervising writers' chats on behalf of AOL and the OSC members. The OSC community now boasts well over 4,000 members, including 120 regular columnists and helpers.

Despite the growth, DeLena is fighting a tough battle. His negotiations with AOL were conducted via e-mail. He kept the e-mail messages and has taken them to three attorneys who, according to DeLena, all say it constitutes a type of contract. "I have enough paper to show that there was a verbal contract," says Laurianne DeLitta, DeLena's attorney in White Plains, N.Y.

AOL, however, contends that no negotiations took place. And the company is resolute that the transition of OSC and 15 other communities onto the Web will proceed as planned in February.

DeLena has gotten fairly creative in trying to stop this move, but to no avail. A plea for help to Sen. Charles Schumer in October accomplished little.

The disputes between AOL members and management echo squabbles in many municipalities. Like shop owners sprucing up Main Street, longtime AOL users have spent years building communities within the service. Because they've helped feed its growth from a backwater into a Web metropolis, they contend they should have some rights. At least, they say, they should have some input when AOL decides to make changes.

AOL, of course, is not a town. It's a business. And if companies are willing to pay millions for prime real estate on the service, guess who has to be relocated? The community leaders who don't pay rent. The fact is that communities on AOL do not belong to any individual. And the company has final say over changes to the communities, including whether they will be housed on the service or on the Web. In other words, AOL volunteers have no veto power. Community leaders have groused about this on bulletin boards and anti-AOL sites, but they have done little to mobilize. They may be missing an opportunity.

"I don't think the community leaders realize what a force they represent," says Anatoly Cross, founder of Hyper-Reality Games, a gaming area on AOL's Digital City. "They don't realize that they can be viewed as a political force as well."

DeLena says he'll fight – in court, if need be – to keep AOL from tossing OSC onto the Web. But he's not interested in taking a greater stand. "I wouldn't even know how," he says of the notion of organizing a community leaders' bill of rights. "I'm just a little guy."