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Name: Justin Weber
Hi all,
This week's poll question is about all the people who, in the past, have used AOL to get online. Discuss here what you think about the heritage of AOL, and, if you like, the poll results themselves.
Thanks!
Justin
hmmmm............AOhell................what is there to say about it. Oh, I know. They make (made) great coffee coasters. Originally, it was floppy disks but then they started sending out the CD-ROM variety of coffee coasters. The closest any AOL software ever got to one of my PC's was if I actually used one of their CD's (or floppy's) as a coaster and set it on my desk within a foot or so of the tower.
Use it, not even if someone else paid for it...................
When I first got online, it was because a friend started his own dialup ISP and required my professional assistance setting it up. I got a free account with him for my troubles. By the time he had to shut his business down (thanks to highspeed) I had heard way too many horror stories about AOL to even consider them.
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It was a step up from Compuserve...LOL!
My wife went to work with AOL so she got it free.
She was one of the reps that talked you into another 30 days free instead of canceling.
I still kept our local ISP because AOL slowed our computer to a crawl.
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AOL was the biggest rippoff ever. You paid for your subscription, got bombarded with ads, now does that make sense? It was great for seniors but now they can't function without it. They are clueless when using other browsers.
IMO it was the worst software ever put out, it jammed up more PC's than carter has liver pills. And yes, as worldlibrary said it slowed a PC to a crawl. I had to use registry cleaners to get all the junk out after the removal.
AOL finally realized their product was trash so they are giving it out for free (but they don't tell the people that are still paying for it)
I had a client using AOL, she was on cable, and still paid the full $29.98 dialup price at the same time for many years. I got her to call AoHell and they dropped the charge and let her use it for free.
They should go down as the biggest ripp-off of all time.
There, now I feel better!Some HELP in posting on Computing.net plus free progs and instructions Cheers
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I hated aol and FINALLY got the ex and 2 daughters to stop using it! Oh yeah the cds also made funny wind chimes (didn't chime but made wild light refractions lol). Still use my "free" aol mail as a basic dumping ground ;).
WinXp Amd 64 3000 Msi Neo2 Platinuim 1 gig ddr 400. When we cast a pebble into a pond we should look past the first ripple.
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It all started one day long ago, back in the days of Win 3.1, when I got my 1st unsolicited AOL floppy in the mail...then another & another & another, etc. Finally I tried it out for the "free trial period". I used it for about 2 yrs before I wised up & went with a local dial-up provider (Localnet) that only charged $10/mo unlimited or $99/yr ($8.25/mo) if you paid in advance. It was still dial-up but it needed no software...just DUN & IE. It was noticeably faster without the AOL bloatware. Anyhow, I started telling my relatives & friends about it & in turn, many of then asked me if I'd remove AOL & hook them up with Localnet or one of the other low cost dial-up services available at the time. Then I started getting referrals to do the same for friends of friends & some of them asked if I could upgrade the memory or modem, CPU, video, etc. To make a long story short, I have to give credit to AOL for getting me started in my computer hobby/side business.
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Yeah AOL is a bunch of junk. I've tried to use their free trial CDs. I've always wondered why they needed a credit card number if it was free? I never was able to try it out because we don't use credit cards and we don't like the idea of bank draft.
AOL is a ripoff, period. I remember a few years ago getting an AOL free trial CD in the mail. I installed it thinking that I'd try it out. Well I got it installed, and selected an access number. I then came to where I had to select a payment method. That was where I canceled it and uninstalled AOL completely. On our next phone bill there was a charge of $21.90 I think it was. It took 1 year of constantly contacting our phone company to get them to take that charge off. We called AOL and the people on the other end got really ugly and rude. The same exact thing happened to a friend of mine.
WinSimple Software
CompTIA A+ Certified
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AOL is a social stigma.
RoadRunner will r*pe you in charges. I switched to FIOS: more speed, better tv, half the cost.
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I never used AOL for one main reason:
I do not want or need anyone to tell me how to search/use the internet. I'll use a home page of my own choice, I'll use a search engine of my own choice, I'll use an email app of my own choice. I don't want to be told what I should be looking at.
My Dad always bought Dell systems that came with AOL and he didn't know any better. He thought that all of the ads, and login prompts and other garbage that he (and Mom) had to put up with were simply part of the "Internet Experience". He lives some distance from the rest of us, so the drive-by explanations and demonstrations that we gave them every few months didn't stick.
Last year my brother and I built him a new system as a gift and showed him what a world without AOL was like. He was so amazed that he went through the painful exercise - at 80 years of age - of switching both his personal and business email addresses from AOL to a different provider so he could completely divest himself from all things AOL.
This summer Mom gets a new system sans AOL and all will be right in their household.
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"I do not want or need anyone to tell me how to search/use the internet. I'll use a home page of my own choice, I'll use a search engine of my own choice, I'll use an email app of my own choice. I don't want to be told what I should be looking at."
Not that I'm defending AOL, but you could have done all that anyway. Once connected to the internet thru AOL, all you'd have to do is minimize it & use another browser (IE, Firefox, etc) & setup an e-mail account with Hotmail, Yahoo, etc
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Then why would I need AOL in the first place?
Wouldn't that be like driving a car I hate to a car I like and then using the car I like to get to my destination?
Why would I need the car I hate in the first place?
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"Then why would I need AOL in the first place?"
Because back in the early 90's, AOL was one of the only choices available. Notice the title of this topic: "Discuss: AOL's Past"
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re: AOL was one of the only choices available
But it wasn't the only choice available.
Back to the car analogy:
If Chevy was "one of the only choices" of cars that I could drive, but not the only choice, would that mean I should drive a Chevy to my other car?
As long as there was another choice available, I chose to use another option and not burden myself with the baggage that came with AOL.
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Would you consider driving a 4wd up a logging road to get to your Lexus.
It's your analogy.
You ever had a no connection/dropped connection from a local Mom & Pop isp?
Skip
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re: It's your analogy.
Not at all.
My analogy was about driving a car I hate, not about driving a car I require.
If I require a 4WD to get my Lexus, I would certainly drive one, but that would be a requirement, and not neccesarily one that I hated.
I don't require 4WD nor did I ever require AOL.
re: You ever had a no connection/dropped connection from a local Mom & Pop isp?
First, you're making the assumption that I was using a poorly run local Mom & Pop ISP and not a stable corporate connection, but we'll play along.
re: You ever had a no connection/dropped connection from a local Mom & Pop isp?
Sure, but not often enough that I needed AOL as a front end everytime or even as a standby. No more than I would keep a 4WD drive on standby for the rare instances that my road is impassable with my Lexus.
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If you ask a Todd Farmer in West Chester, PA., what he thinks about AOL, he'd probably say the company was the sh!t. He was that dude that sold his AOL 1.0 Startup Floppy on fleabay for over 9,000 buckaroos.
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Don't mention AOL to me !
We had that in 2000 when we first had our Packard bell PC haha!
Back in the day of Dial up :P
I hated AOL. It was the crappiest crap ever!
& i think it still is.
I'm on TalkTalk now. It's pretty good but i do wish i was on Virgin Media, They seem more reliable than any others.
AOL is Dead***************************
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