AOL executives must be fairly confident the company can make the transition to an advertising powerhouse, because the once powerful internet provider is spending money lately as if it's going out of style.

A month after dropping $850 million to acquire British social network Bebo, AOL has bought content aggregator Sphere. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Kara Swisher of All Things Digital said the price was more than $25 million.

Sphere brings together mainstream content with content from blogs and social networks and draws about 2 billion page views a month across a network of 50,000 content providers. Sphere had previously worked with AOL to develop widgets for AOL's existing websites.

Last week, AOL launched the AOL Technology Network, a series of blogs designed so advertisers could integrate campaigns across a number of sites. On Monday, the company scored a major victory by landing Verizon's advertising inventory.