Turner's resignation from AOL won't stop criticism of merger. (Banking & Finance: Special Report - To Deal or Not to Deal).

Don't be fooled.

Ted Turner's decision to quit his vice chairman post at AOL Time Warner Inc. won't take him from the stage. Whether he'll remain a director is unclear, but the notion of Ted Turner, less fettered, should send shivers down the spines of critics and fans alike.

He has openly lamented the decimated value of his AOL Time Warner shares, which have fueled - and now restrict - his philanthropic giving.

But don't look for Turner to bid for any asset he sold in 1996 to Time Warner Inc. - including CNN. It's a matter of money. He has lost at least $7 billion since AOL's stock started to decline in the two years since the merger, and his 117.2 million shares are worth about $1.2 billion. He has about $700 million pledged to charities. (On the week of his resignation as vice chairman, he sold $20 million of AOL Time Warner stock.)

Seller's remorse

Seldom has there been a more public case of seller's remorse. After he sold his Turner Broadcasting System Inc. to Time Warner Inc., Turner took an operating role to oversee his cable TV networks and production, but he never set corporate strategy.

He publicly supported the merger with America Online Inc., announced in January 2000, and then was shut out of an operating role when the merger was completed in 2001. Turner has alternately blamed the architects of the merger - former AOL Chairman Steve Case and former Time Warner Chairman Gerald Levin - and himself for not voting against the deal when he had reservations, friends say.

Turner was set to quit the vice chairman post 13 months ago, but was persuaded to stay after Levin abruptly announced his own retirement and tapped Dick Parsons as his successor.

Now, Turner evidently wants to shed the constraints of his post, which still lacks any operating responsibility but pays a minimum $1 million annual salary. Although his employment agreement doesn't expire until Dec. 31, Turner informed Parsons that he had decided to resign his "executive duties as vice chairman" in May.

Turner may decide to remain on the board to keep an eye on management and directors, or he may quit to have more freedom to agitate or sell shares without public scrutiny. The 64-year-old philanthropist appears to have rebounded from the depression he openly suffered in 2001 when his marriage to Jane Fonda ended in divorce, a granddaughter died and he was stripped of authority at AOL Time Warner.

In recent months, friends and acquaintances report that Turner appears fit and feisty.

When Turner showed up in the CNN newsroom on election night in November, he told a visiting Los Angeles Times reporter that he had been cautioned not to comment about AOL Time Warner. But he added, laughing, "You can write that he walked away humming the tune, 'Oh, we ain't got a barrel of mon-ey ..."'

Captain courageous

Turner burst onto the national stage when he won the America's Cup in 1977, as the skipper of "Courageous." But a few months earlier, he made the first of many innovative moves that would change television. In December 1976, Turner originated the "superstation" concept by transmitting the signal of an Atlanta television station to cable systems via satellite.

In 1980, he launched CNN, the world's first all-news television network. Rebuffed in a 1985 bid to buy CBS, Turner turned to Hollywood to buy MGM Entertainment Company, in a deal that ultimately cost him true control of his company. To stay afloat, he accepted $562 million from a consortium of cable TV operators in 1987, with the two strongest cable operators - Tele-Communications Inc.'s John Malone and Time Warner Inc. - gaining veto power over acquisitions. Discouraged, Turner chose to sell his company to Time Warner in 1996.

Turner's dismay has likely turned to disgust. Read his resignation as a protest vote, to disassociate himself from the merger he rues. And sooner or later, Turner will raise his voice. He can't stop himself.