When the $182 billion merger of America Online and Time Warner was announced on Monday, it dominated headlines and investors salivated.

The deal offers advantages to the average citizen. There is little economic downside to the merger. AOL and Time Warner dominate separate segments of media communications.

According to CNN, AOL boasts more than 20 million subscribers through its AOL and Compuserve Internet services. Time Warner quite simply owns everything else.

In the corporate board rooms, the deal looks good because the companies complement each other. AOL wants access to Time Warner’s high-speed broadband system, as well as the 13 million cable subscribers. Time Warner hopes to use AOL to boost the visibility of its magazines, cables stations and movie studios.

The claim that Time Warner will reap a huge reward from the deal is hard to verify. Most people ignore online advertisements, and increasing the exposure of HBO and Time magazine does not guarantee more sales.

For consumers, Internet access through the existing cable system will eliminate the overuse of phone lines while providing much faster connection speeds.

While the term “world’s largest merger” sounds impressive, the most interesting aspect of the deal is not the financial might of the new company, but how a company with relatively humble beginnings essentially bought out the largest media company in the world.

The new company will be called AOL Time Warner. Although a merger and not a buyout, the details of the stock shares in the new company reveal that AOL has a higher value relative to Time Warner.

It takes 1.5 Time Warner shares to get one share in the new company, while AOL holders are trading straight up. The terms of the deal provide AOL with a 55 percent share in the new company.

AOL is less than a decade old and employs 12,000 people. Time Inc. and Warner Bros. have existed as separate companies for decades before they merged 10 years ago; together they currently employ 67,000. AOL is nothing more than a collection of buildings scattered across the country filled with Internet connection hardware. It does nothing but allow people to transfer data. Contrast this with Time Warner, which must maintain printing and distribution facilities, staff studios and operate multiple cable channels.

AOL essentially produces nothing but has achieved market success due to overvalued stock and determined investors. Since this time last year AOL stock value has gone up 900 percent. Although it is not my place to debate the mechanics of the New York Stock Exchange, that a company with no physical product was able to buy out a long-standing titan of industry is incredible, especially when one considers that Time Warner has sales three times greater than AOL.

As surprising as the merger is, the situation reflects new realities.

Internet companies are hot right now and although you may read People magazine while waiting in the doctor’s office, is it really more important than your Internet connection? The proliferation of online accounts and web sites indicates otherwise, as does the flow of investment capital.

I see no reason to fear the new media monolith. Large companies have always been able to do things faster and cheaper than smaller competitors, and in a market economy, the consumer always benefits. Anybody over 30 can probably remember the halcyon days of AT&T before Judge Green, when phone bills were legible and nobody ever annoyed you at eight in the morning with pleas to switch long-distance phone carriers. Benevolent dictatorships work.

As long as the market operates on capitalist principles and not on a policy of total screwage, the consumer should fare decently. If the new company were to act in collusion with competitors, like the gas stations in Ames that raised prices four cents per gallon the night before classes let out, we might have a problem. However, the government’s track record on tackling businesses that engage in unfair trade practices is proven. Witness the Department of Justice case against Microsoft, which has a value two-and-a-half times greater than the projected AOL Time Warner company.

Critics of the merger are sour grapes and reflect a fear borne out of uncertainty. Either that, or they are envious they never bought stock.

While consumer groups are trying to point out anti-trust issues and possible abuses of power, it is far more likely that the new company will simply seek to expand its market share and assets through legal means.

It is doubtful that the newly formed company will do anything to draw the wrath of the federal government, which can declare eminent domain and act with impunity to break up the company.

For those of us on the sidelines, we can only hope that the merger will bring greater prosperity. And kick ourselves for not buying stock a year ago.

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Aaron Woell is a senior in political science from Bolingbrook, Ill.