AOL pulls the plug on Patch

According to an article in GeekWire, AOL has pulled the plug on its hyperlocal blogs, called "Patch".

Rumors have been swirling for a year that Patch was failing to make money for its corporate sponsor and that its stories were not making goal on number of hits.

Some editors, including the local Patch editor, were fired in December, and Patch went to a model of multiple editions under one editor. Quality suffered as a result, as the editions relied on press releases and regional stories.

Friday, August 16, 2013, AOL pulled the plug on its entire Washington network. Most staff were laid off with just a small crew left until October 15 when the entire operation will shut down.

It is unknown what will happen to the sites.

Read the entire story in GeekWire.