AOL should be dumped, says Turner

AOL Time Warner's biggest shareholder Ted Turner has reignited the debate over the future of the world's biggest media company after saying the company might be better off without its troubled internet division, America Online.

Mr Turner also said he was likely to remain on the board when he steps down as vice chairman in May and challenged fellow media veteran Rupert Murdoch to a fist fight.

The outspoken media mogul, who claims to have personally lost up to £5bn as a result of the plummeting value of the company since the merger in 2001, became the latest in a string of AOL Time Warner executives to stand down earlier this year.

"I wonder whether being part of AOL Time Warner is the best way," he said at a breakfast briefing organised by the New Yorker magazine. "I can't tell you one company that has had a foot placed in the old media business that has been successful in the new media business."

The internet division has been blamed for dragging down the company's share price as it battles with a government investigation into accounting errors and struggles to hold on to subscribers and compete in the broadband market.

Despite once describing the merger of the two companies as "better than sex", Mr Turner has since frequently criticised the record-breaking deal.

He also widened his rift with the current management by pointing out that only two directors had extensive experience of the media and entertainment industries.

The AOL Time Warner chief executive, Richard Parsons, spent most of his career in law, politics and banking, and joined Time Warner's board less than a decade ago, Mr Tuner noted.

"I think it is good to know something about what they are doing," he said.

During the interview with Ken Auletta, author of a book about Microsoft and the US government, Mr Turner also displayed the eccentric sense of humour that has made him famous far beyond the business pages.

As well as joking before an audience of businessmen and journalists about the 80% decline in his own personal fortune, he said he had volunteered to report from Baghdad for CNN, the 24-news channel he founded and later sold to Time Warner.

At one point, he interrupted his interviewers to sing verses of Cole Porter's Don't Fence Me In. Later he relished aloud the idea of challenging fellow media mogul Rupert Murdoch, 72, to a fist fight.

Through a spokesman, Mr Murdoch responded: "The last thing Ted needs these days is a licking from me."