Now HBO, arguably the edgiest entity in AOL's stable and the most willing to take chances, is looking to create some synergies of its own. It's not tapping a company in AOL's orbit to do it, and it may point the way for smaller, content-driven online businesses looking to create new revenue streams.

HBO Friday cut a deal with Salon Media Group, producer of Salon.com, an award-winning online magazine that seems to be cut from the same cloth as HBO itself. HBO's HBO Pictures division Friday optioned the rights to an autobiographical essay by Salon columnist Erin Aubry Kaplan. Kaplan has written extensively on the issue of race and culture in America.

The essay, "The Color of Love," tells the story of how Kaplan, a black journalist, meets her husband, Alan Kaplan, a white high school teacher accused of racism by the parents of his black students.

"According to the parents pushing the story, Kaplan was guilty of racial impertinence. (These parents hoped that, as a black woman, I would be sympathetic to their viewpoint.)," Kaplan writes in her essay. "They said he was intellectually arrogant in a white-privilege sort of way, eager to overwhelm his black students' frail sense of self-esteem by, among other things, extending the discussion of slavery to issues of latter-day segregation in his classroom. Kaplan insisted that the system failed black and white students alike, and asked his students to confront the racial achievement gap in his classroom and to question why teachers have different sets of expectations for black and white students."

In the midst of interviewing the teacher over the course of five hours, a romance blossoms.

"It's a great story that lends itself wonderfully to dramatic adaptation," said Priscilla Cohen of Michael Siegel & Associates, the agency that represented Salon.com in the deal. "Students and parents persuade this journalist to cover the story, assuming she'll condemn Kaplan as they have. She comes to interview him and essentially never leaves."

But beyond the story itself, Salon is busy trying to prove that while content may no longer be king, it's still a viable business model. The company just secured $2.5 million in new financing from a group of 11 investors, and Michael O'Donnell, president and chief executive officer of Salon Media Group, is clearly looking to capitalize on Salon's content by creating a new revenue stream from optioning rights.

"Many of Salon's articles are ideal for television and film adaptations and we're excited to see HBO Pictures option these rights," O'Donnell said. "We'll be working closely with our representatives, Michael Siegal & Associates and the industry to explore various distribution channels."

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