It can be argued that AOL is the granddaddy of the social Web. They were the first to have a buddies list, the first to really get instant messaging, groups, email as a social graph and they were the first to integrate all of these in one service.

Lately they seem to be making a push back to their social roots with an entire division called People Networks built around their social properties (Bebo, AIM, Yedda, Socialthing and ICQ). AOL has previously launched social-networking features called Social Inbox, which is a one-stop destination with aggregated social feeds from across the Web, multiple email accounts and media recommendations. However, as Ziv Navoth, SVP marketing at people networks told me in our interview two weeks ago, AOL is planning much more to come. AOL plans to allow consumers to aggregate their disparate piles of online information through connective offerings that allow them to pool all kinds of Web content and communications in one place. In other words: Life Streaming. I will have more on this when it goes live.

AOL also recently announced a new country manager for Israel; Avichay Nissenbaum, CEO of Yedda. Avichay has an extensive background in the start-up industry; his first company  SmarTeam which focused on product lifecycle management was acquired by Dassault Systems in 1999, and Q&A site Yedda was bought by AOL in 2007.

In his role as Country Manager Avichay will focus on establishing better connections with the Israeli Web scene by promoting AOL’s developer network and the services that power known brands such as AIM, ICQ, Bebo, Winamp and Mapquest. His attention will also be focused on identifying local companies of value for potential acquisition. AOL currently has over 200 employees in Israel across several companies it has acquired over the years, namely: ICQ, Relegance, Quigo and Yedda. Avichay is one of the most knowledgeable and experienced leaders in the Israeli hi-tech industry and also a dear friend. I wish him much luck in his new role.

AOL sure is in an interesting place these days. They have a brand new CEO (ex Google VP – Tim Armstrong), a legacy dial-up access business (that more than twenty years after it was launched) still makes billions of dollars a year and the rest of AOL split up into three different groups; 1) Platform A which is one of largest advertising networks 2) Media Glow which includes AOL.com and mega blogs like TMZ and Engadget plus 3) The group which most interests me; People Networks which includes AIM, ICQ, Bebo, Yedda, Goowy and the newly acquired SocialThing.

People Networks are now planning an extensive synergy of all these properties (and also 3^rd party outside content) under the banner of “life streaming” where users will be able to syndicate all their online activity into one stream.

Yesterday I was lucky enough to have a conversation with Ziv Navoth SVP for Marketing and Partnerships at AOL.  Ziv is an extremely interesting guy. While running marketing at Bebo, he grew the user base from 22 million to 45 million users and pioneered numerous innovations including a new business model for media companies to distribute and monetize their content and a new form of online entertainment, combining original productions with brand sponsorship. Since the Bebo acquisition his task at AOL has been to expand a network already 90+ million strong. See my full conversation with him below.