Gerald M. Levin, a media executive who ran the world’s largest media company, Time Warner, and who became an architect of its merger with America online, the world’s largest internet company, then headed by Steve Case, died on March 13. He was 84.

The merger was widely considered the worst corporate marriage in American history. AOL’s stock price slid more than 30 percent between the deal’s announcement in January and its approval that December by the Federal Trade Commission, pushing AOL’s proposed $165 billion purchase of Time Warner — in stock and assumed debt — down to $112 billion.

By the start of 2002, AOL Time Warner’s market value was around $127 billion. That year, the company posted a net loss of $98.7 billion, a record for a U.S. company. Mr. Levin resigned in 2002.

Blame for the failure was placed on a variety of factors, including the bursting of the dot-com bubble, the cultural differences between Time Warner’s old media and AOL’s new media, and a clash of egos between the two CEO’s.