AOL - The Saviour of the Internet

First of all, imagine the internet without AOL. I remember this myself - I once used it for a few weeks back in 1992, and it was like a desert, boring and dry. It was populated almost entirely by academics and computer nerds of the worst sort, and it was difficult to find places on the internet (what little there was of it) regarding exciting, varied pastimes.

Enter AOL

AOL swept all of this away. By giving access to millions of normal Americans, AOL made the internet far more diverse. Now, if I want to talk to people who don't define themselves as geeks, but as normal people with normal interests, it is easy to do so. No longer is the internet the province of white, middle class computer nerds, a place of arcane knowledge. Everybody can use it, everyone has a place. This makes it millions of times more interesting to browse, there is a lot more varied information, and varied people. Whether I want to find out about bondage from a 25 year professional, ice skating, journalism, gerbil breeding, music composition, oil painting, it is just a matter of visiting google and reading the information.

So why does AOL get such a bad press in certain demographics? Could it be jealousy? Or a repugnant, smug feeling of superiority? I would argue yes. The simple fact is that the only people who dislike AOL are certain geeks. They hate it because AOL has ruined their little ivory tower for them, and "stolen" the internet clean away. They see the internet as theirs to do with as they please, and it galls them that AOL dare come along and empower the varied masses, destroying the hegemony of the geeks by making the internet easy for everyone.

I find this despicably selfish of them. These people could be fighting for causes that actually matter, but instead they get upset about trivialities out of snobbishness. AOL has done the world a service by enfranchising the average person (average in the sense of "average technological knowledge" - in this sense, a talented classical composer or sublime novelist might be "average"), and yet because these average people have no interest in Linux, haven't heard about the DMCA and such obscure causes, and faithfully vote democrat, republican or green instead of for some extremist political fringe organisation they are lambasted by the oh-so-smug-and-superior-aren't-we geeks.

Geeks also hate AOL because they live lifes of social rejection, I suspect. They try to rationalise this by thinking they just have "high standards", and think they have no friends because they are so misunderstood and can't find people who think like them. This means that they naturally become insufferable elitists, exacerbating their own problems. So how were they to react when a tide of perhaps naive but friendly people burst onto the net in 1993? One might have thought they would have welcomed such varied people. Perhaps they couldn't write a unix shell script, but they knew how to make a marriage work and how to change a diaper - essential life skills of far more relevance than programming a texas instruments graphics calculator. If only the natives of the net at that time had been more friendly, more open minded, perhaps a great coming together would have happened, and the geeks would have learned about the world beyond their keyboards and how to live in it. But noooo, they had to be all "1337", and reject the influx, and pretend to be superior to a group of people of far more interest, experience and friendliness than the geeks ever could be.

Why are AOL #1? Lets review:

AOL Provide a good, reliable, cheap service. This is obvious, if they didn't they wouldn't be the leading ISP in America. From a pure performance standpoint, AOL are up there with the best.
AOL, through their massive media partnerships, provide good relevant content, much better than most of the nonsense other ISP's offer.
You can rest easy in bed knowing that your children won't get into any mischief on AOL. They keep your children safe from the dark side of the internet, while offering all the benefits. AOL stands for family values.
AOL are easy to use. They provide a good browser only to AOL customers that integrates everything you need to use on the web into one place. They have a wonderful online help system and everything is very easy to navigate and figure out.
Special AOL only services, such as AOL Instant Messaging, have revolutionised the internet. By opting for AOL, you get the full benefits of this feature in its native environment.
Everyone uses AOL! All your friends and aquaintances are probably using it already. By using AOL too, it is easier for you to email them and stay in tough with them.
AOL groups & chatrooms are a great place to meet people and make new friends, famed throughout the internet. Sure, some of them have a bad reputation according to some people, but as long as you leave the teen chat rooms to your children and concentrate on groups dealing with your normal interests (be it gardening, roller skating, Bonsai trees...), you should find them a very useful resource. Furthermore, AOL ensure that the quality of discussion remains high.

AOL has had its criticisms in the past and present. For example, it was rightfully condemned when it decided to delete non-English messages from its forums, due to American users being unable to guage the authenticity of such messages. However, they showed that they do respond to criticism by backing down - this is the hallmark of a democratic, responsive commercial company, always looking out for the needs of its customers.

AOL do their best to help the community. They have a special AOL Time-Warner Foundation, who's goals are to "[Use] the power of media, communications and information technology to serve the public interest and strengthen society." This wonderful, altruistic foundation saves the lives of many children each and every year, by equipping children for the 21st century, extending internet benefits to all (a classic AOL goal), engaging communities in the Arts and empowering citizens and civic participation. How can anyone oppose such goals? Search me, better ask a geek.

They are often unjustly criticised for their success. Many a liberatarian, music stealing geek has attacked AOL self righteously claiming it has a monopoly. This is so much nonsense. AOL is big, for sure, but it is big for a reason - it is big because it is good. It does not have a monopoly though, for there are plenty of other ISP's out there. Also, vertical integration is a good thing for the end user. Only with AOL can you get the content of Time Warner filtered through an ISP then squirted down AOL owned wires to your cable modem at the end. AOL simplifies things for everyone - why use more than one company at once? Do you have a "telephone provider" and a "telephone access provider" and a "telephone power provider" and a "telephone content provider"? No, you use one company, and choose it carefully. AOL have realised that the internet was too complicated to use before, and made the whole process as simple and easy as using a telephone. What can possibly be wrong with that?

As I look at the wonderful variety of the net today, I thank God for AOL. AOL is the internet, in a metaphorical sense, and AOL'ers are the salt of the Earth, to be celebrated for making the internet have relevance to the rest of the world. Sure, the natives should get some credit for designing the infrastructure, but AOL'ers as a group deserve far more for providing the content.

	How soon we forget. (none / 0) (#3)
	by Anonymous Reader on Tue Aug 7th, 2001 at 05:23:55 PM PST

	AOL wasn't originally an ISP. It was a BBS. (remember those?) A very pretty, glorified, graphical BBS that was somewhat ahead of it's time but a BBS nonetheless. Internet connectivity was very much an afterthought. So much of an afterthough, in fact, that they were the most god-awful, unreliable, pathetically broken, proprietary ISP around for several years. This is the primary reason why they were hated. They DID NOT DELIVER WHAT THEY PROMISED, reliable internet access. The fact that they dumped a bunch of clueless newbies onto the net all at once certainly didn't help, but I agree that faulting them for that is a bit elitist. Your analysis is way off the mark, IMO. If anyone needs a good reason to hate AOL now, the AOL/Time Warner merger should give them plenty.... And I hear you can still get regular busy signals in some areas....

	No way (none / 0) (#5)
	by bc on Tue Aug 7th, 2001 at 05:35:43 PM PST

	If anyone needs a good reason to hate AOL now, the AOL/Time Warner merger should give them plenty.... And I hear you can still get regular busy signals in some areas.... Why should I hate (a very strong word) AOL for the Time Warner merger? Are you completely blinkered? As far as I am concerned it improves the service AOL can offer - they can provide some of the world's best content over broadband. An excellent idea. I can't think of any reason why AOL should be hateworthy for this merger - arguments that it is a monopoly do not apply, as they have plenty of competition. Your other points appear to be mostly historical. ♥, bc.

	way (none / 0) (#22)
	by Anonymous Reader on Fri Aug 31st, 2001 at 08:52:48 AM PST

	I firmly believe that ISPs should stay out of the content business. It would be like Operating System vendors being in the software application business. (Nevermind that telnet.exe is still broken after 10 years.... I REALLY need Microsoft Movie Maker shipped with my OS) Oh wait... They are. Nevermind.....

	Great quote (none / 0) (#6)
	by Anonymous Reader on Tue Aug 7th, 2001 at 06:02:29 PM PST

	[Use] the power of media, communications and information technology to serve the public interest and strengthen society. Bzzzt. Thanks for playing AOLTimeWarner! Your mission is to make lots and lots of money and keep your stock price high. Anything else is an afterthought which you demonstrate day after day to your customers. And you'll slowly and quiety reduce the quality of your product (hehe, is that even possible?) to improve your profits until you hit a point predetermined by an accountant at which you start losing customers. I don't have a problem with the people who use AOL. Newbies are newbies no matter if they come from AOL or some other ISP. I have a problem with a company with a substandard product. The above poster is correct in stating that you still can get busy signals. The AOL software takes up a ridiculous amount of room on your hard drive. My suggestion is this: find a local ISP. Ask around about it's service. I almost guarantee you their service will be better and cheaper than AOL.

	If you can find one (none / 0) (#11)
	by Anonymous Reader on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 12:10:28 AM PST

	AOL brings diversity in the form of isolated people from Buttfuck, Nowheresville who might not otherwise have an internet connection.

	AOL (none / 0) (#13)
	by Anonymous Reader on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 05:25:55 AM PST

	AOL doesn't service my half of the area code. If you want to connect you have to call Buffalo, NY, long distance. What irks me is that they used to service our area, then stopped, buttfucking many local users in the process.

	Anonymous (none / 0) (#14)
	by jeek on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 05:28:32 AM PST

	As I am known for my stance against anonymous commenting.. I just wanted to say that the previous post concerning Buffalo was from me, I was trying to comment and I had forgotten to click the account activation button.

	Powerlink available yet? (none / 0) (#17)
	by Husaria on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 10:50:31 AM PST

	You've got more options too, including other dial-ups, Buffnet, and Powerlink, (although it sucks). Look around. I'm in Lancaster, so I've got a whole variety of stuff to choose from. But I'm pretty sure, if you can have cable tv, you'll get a modem too. Sig sigger

	Libertarian? (none / 0) (#7)
	by Anonymous Reader on Tue Aug 7th, 2001 at 06:13:16 PM PST

	the libertarian roots of the Internet I don't get it. Please explain how the libertarian philosophy has anything to do with the "roots of the internet". I have a feeling we haven't done our homework...

	AOL, the savior of the Internet? (none / 0) (#9)
	by Firehawk on Tue Aug 7th, 2001 at 07:03:12 PM PST

	Hi, I found your article to be interesting. I agree with most of your article, except for a few things. First of all, I think the animus to AOL members comes from people who believe that the Internet is not being respected or used effectively by AOL members. Another reason for the animus to AOL members is from people who dislike anyone who they can deprecate without fear of retribution. I agree that AOL has provided a good interface to using the Internet. Except that AOL was originally a proprietary online service. You may remember those from the early nineties as we had AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, ZDnet and even good old MSN. What I object to is that AOL has prevented anyone from using their IM service to communicate with individuals with AIM, from people using other kinds of instant chat clients. AOL is nto the most efficient online service. If you ever had the fun of using AOL when the highest modem speed was 14.4 and trying to get into a jammed pop server, then you do not know of frustration. AOL's success came from their mind-blowing marketing campaign as AOL diskettes and then AOL cdrom's were poping up every where you looked. In the mail, in your average fashion magazine and even in your textbook, you could not escape from AOL's rain of marketing. The one thing you should have mentioned is that AOL's President, Steve Case, had to go public and make an apology to the lack of enough modem banks, dial-up lines and bandwith to accomodate all of the people who became members back in 1995-1996 (I think.) So who knows will happen with AOL in the future. Oh and one more thing. AOL was one of the plaintiffs who demanded that Microsoft remove the desktop icon, inviting people to try the MSN network. When Microsoft relented and allowed the other online providers to put their own client software into Windwos 95, AOL was all too eager to put their client into the Windows 95 mix.

	Nope, the first... (5.00 / 2) (#20)
	by finn on Fri Aug 24th, 2001 at 03:08:45 AM PST

	1/3rd of my posts? As of when you wrote that, that would be ... two posts ... That would be the point... :) It's a well kept secret, but a lot of providers pay a huge amount of money to be indepentantly tested for performance. That was what I wanted to know... Now I can honestly tell my customers that AOL aren't very good. Agreed, but what are those 70 as a percentage? If it was 70%, I'd shut up, but I'm guessing it isn't... Of this particular database, 7%. The point here is that some people are incapable of learning how to use a standard ISP dial-up account, or simply don't want to. Not to mention the fact that some people don't want standard access to the Internet, merely to some of the services - which AOL provides. If, for them, it offers what they need, why change to anything more? That site however, is the antithesis again, of what AOL stands for. As are all the other sites I mentioned, for different reasons. They are 'famed', AOL is not. AOL may be a house-hold name, and those sites are not. It's all about context and culture again, really. Turn that around - AOL is the antithesis to the Stileproject. It provides a place where parents don't have to worry about access to porn, the Anarchist's Cookbook, goatsex, while allowing the pretense of rebellion into subversive politics, global contact and bubblegum Wicca, without the jagged edge that would cause harm. ----------

	This is fun! Weeeeee! (1.50 / 2) (#18)
	by Wiggy on Thu Aug 23rd, 2001 at 06:38:51 AM PST

	OK, let's take this one lazy, slow, step at a time. I can feel a flamewar brewing, and that is not my intention, but I need to point out a few things here: On the one hand, we have the incontrovertible proof that AOL is the most popular product since the Pill. Pur-lease! Can we have your source on this one? I'm having problems believing it. Also, surely, I don't need to point out here on adequacy.org that popularism is no indication of quality. E.g. - slashdot.org is one of the most popular sites on the net. So is Stileproject. They're both stooping to the lowest common denominator, just like AOL does. Let me be the first to tell you that when you crawl up out of the gutter and attempt to interact with we grownups here on the real Internet, that kind of bathroom talk is simply not acceptable. But you don't like the real Internet - you like AOL! Now you're saying that AOL is the real Internet? Oh dear. As far as interacting like a grown-up, I can do that. I just don't think that the article posted concerning AOL was a grown-up article. It was badly thought out, highly offensive to techs who work in the industry, and was specifically aimed to make people feel like crap if they aren't AOL-ers. That's grown-up debate? Ummmm.... OK. You will find that if you are unable to conduct yourself in a civilized manner, you will be cast back into the slime pit that taught you such disrespectful behavior. Is that a threat? I think it's a threat. If it is a threat, you're stooping low here. You're threatening me because I'm saying AOL is technically inferior and vastly more expensive than it's competitors? And to think ... we were just talking about grown-up behaviour ... You need to get yourself an AOL account today, to find out what you've been missing. And you need to wash your mouth out with soap, too, my friend. Shame on you! No. I don't. I have several thousand quids worth of network infrastructure of my own. I've worked in the ISP industry since I was 19. I have a 2Mb/sec DSL line into my flat. I have servers around my feet. I read, and contribute to RFCs that define how the Internet will work in the future. I implement code to make the Internet work. The last thing I need right now is an AOL account. I need AOL, and the rest of the world needs AOL, like a hole in the head. As for washing my mouth with soap? Ummm... can you say 'vulagrity of language is in the ear of the listener, you fucking moron?' - interesting debate though. What constitutes 'offensive language' and why is it offensive? Hmmmm.

	BS (none / 0) (#23)
	by Anonymous Reader on Sat Dec 1st, 2001 at 05:56:42 PM PST

	You know there is a reson at any computer repair techintion that is worth their weight in shit refers to AOL as AOHELL. AOL is an extermly poorly written program. I found an ad in a magize that said People grow out of things, AOL is one of them. That is what you should do. In fact have you really even tried anything besides AOHELL?

	Ummm... are you on crack? (5.00 / 3) (#12)
	by Wiggy on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 03:52:22 AM PST

	I know this was posted on the 7th, but I didn't see it back then. I have just read it now however, and feel a few comments are in order: So why does AOL get such a bad press in certain demographics? Could it be jealousy? Or a repugnant, smug feeling of superiority? I would argue yes. The simple fact is that the only people who dislike AOL are certain geeks. They hate it because AOL has ruined their little ivory tower for them, and "stolen" the internet clean away. AOL hasn't stolen anything away. The reason people dislike AOL so much is because it's customers are people like you. Ignorant, stupid, and always going on about how great AOL is... They see the internet as theirs to do with as they please, and it galls them that AOL dare come along and empower the varied masses, destroying the hegemony of the geeks by making the internet easy for everyone. Actually, it doesn't belong to anybody. However, seeing as the whole thing is built upon standards set down by the IETF and RFCs are a little bit too hard for most AOLers to understand, the 'geeks' tend to get left to it. Perhaps your problem is that you know you will never be able to truly understand how the net works, and you dislike the fact that you are surrounded by people who do. Do you have a small penis by any chance? Whether I want to find out about bondage from a 25 year professional, ice skating, journalism, gerbil breeding, music composition, oil painting, it is just a matter of visiting google and reading the information. I hate to break this to you, but Google is not part of AOL. Google would have happened if AOL had never happened. In fact, Google are the antithesis of AOL. They believe in open platforms (www.google.com/bsd) and minimalist advertising. You may also be shocked to hear this, but the vast majority of content you might find on Google is not AOL-specific. Why are AOL #1? Lets review: This should be fun... AOL Provide a good, reliable, cheap service. This is obvious, if they didn't they wouldn't be the leading ISP in America. From a pure performance standpoint, AOL are up there with the best. Well, in the UK (where they also claim the top spot), their performance is acknowleged as awful. The reason they have so many customers is because of their 'invasive marketing' techniques - how many AOL CDs do you have in your home right now? If you buy a computer magazine on a regular basis you will have at least one. Even though I'm the admin of an ISP, I've just checked and there was one less than 2 feet away. The style of marketing AOL use means they have a high market penetration. AOL, through their massive media partnerships, provide good relevant content, much better than most of the nonsense other ISP's offer. I haven't been on AOL in five years, so I wouldn't know what AOL-only content is available. However, I strongly suspect the majority of content you're viewing is not actually provided by AOL. If you could cite some examples for us to look at, I'd be interested to see this. Personally though, I suspect being handed content by one company and one set of editors would not really be to my taste. You can rest easy in bed knowing that your children won't get into any mischief on AOL. They keep your children safe from the dark side of the internet, while offering all the benefits. AOL stands for family values. Ahhh ... the old baby-sitter argument. It used to be that parents who just didn't give a damn would plonk their brats in front of the TV rather than interat with them. The kids would be quiet, parents didn't need to bother. But then, shock! horror! - some naughty language and violence was seen on TV and the corruption of the little minds of the children was in the hands of the TV companies. It SURELY couldn't be the parents fault for not checking what was being viewed by their kids, or even perhaps encouraging their kids to do something more than sit around watching the crap... it's the same argument with the net. If you're going to leave your kids unsupervised, you're a bad parent. The fact you take comfort in AOL doing your job for you just makes me want to phone social services. AOL are easy to use. They provide a good browser only to AOL customers that integrates everything you need to use on the web into one place. They have a wonderful online help system and everything is very easy to navigate and figure out. The 'good browser' is Netscape. Funnily enough, I can use it as well. The 'integrartes everything you need to use on the web into one place' is called a 'portal' combined with a 'bookmark file'. These are available outside of AOL. The 'wonderful online help system' is something you are only likely to need if you have an IQ below 90. This is the net, not rocket science. Special AOL only services, such as AOL Instant Messaging, have revolutionised the internet. By opting for AOL, you get the full benefits of this feature in its native environment. Ummm... AIM is available without AOL. It's 'native environment' is a load of cruddy libraries that come with Netscape. It's not an AOL-only feature. Plus, in case you hadn't noticed, ICQ is more popular. AIM is specifically designed to sell more advertising space anyway. Bit of a lame product really. Everyone uses AOL! All your friends and aquaintances are probably using it already. By using AOL too, it is easier for you to email them and stay in tough with them. I'll assume you meant 'touch' - unless you and your friends are all in some secret bondage club or something. I can honestly say that with the exception of one person, nobody I know uses AOL. I've had one single, solitary business contact give me an AOL address. The only people I can imagine using AOL are the sort of people who have never used the Net before, use it for a short while, work out they can get a better deal for less money elsewhere, and 'graduate' into a proper Net user. AOL groups & chatrooms are a great place to meet people and make new friends, famed throughout the internet. Sure, some of them have a bad reputation according to some people, but as long as you leave the teen chat rooms to your children and concentrate on groups dealing with your normal interests (be it gardening, roller skating, Bonsai trees...), you should find them a very useful resource. Furthermore, AOL ensure that the quality of discussion remains high. Yeah, leave the teen chat rooms to your children. I bet you do. For a start, AOL chat rooms are not famed throughout the Internet. Slashdot is famed, StileProject is famed, Usenet is famed, The Onion is famed, and all of these allow opinions to be expressed that AOL will specifically censor. What AOL is known for is child molestors and warez kiddies. That's why it's got a bad name.

	Crack and AOL and stuff (5.00 / 2) (#15)
	by finn on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 05:42:41 AM PST

	First off, I would like to know what it is with you and crack... Fully 1/3 of your comments reference crack in some way. Do YOU have some (maybe subconcious) desire to experiment with this drug? Also, why do all of your references to crack imply crack makes you post unconventional ideas? Do you have some links that prove that (use of) crack and posting alternative viewpoints are cause and effect? Secondly, you posted this with no references to back up your claims... The author of the article at least made that effort. You make strong claims: (in no particular order) "Well, in the UK (where they also claim the top spot), their performance is acknowleged as awful." Who acknowledges this? You? By your own admission "I haven't been on AOL in five years". Some internet authority? Without reference, this could be a claim by your next-door neighbours cat by screaching at an AOL CD. "AIM is specifically designed to sell more advertising space anyway." Please post or link to the AOL marketing strategy that specifically states this. Otherwise this conjecture merely shows that you object to a firm making money from its products. "However, seeing as the whole thing is built upon standards set down by the IETF and RFCs are a little bit too hard for most AOLers to understand, the 'geeks' tend to get left to it." I've got to say that most of the RFCs I've read aren't exactly light reading. And why should I know SMTP codes to be allowed to email? "I can honestly say that with the exception of one person, nobody I know uses AOL. I've had one single, solitary business contact give me an AOL address." Your personal experience may not be indicative of the rest of the world, you know. A quick search of one of our company databases throws up nearly 70 AOL email addresses, all businesses. "Slashdot is famed, StileProject is famed, Usenet is famed, The Onion is famed" Which group are these sites famous amongst? Certainly not the majority of Internet users. I only heard about the Stileproject yesterday, and I've been using the Internet for about 5 years. Not a huge length of time, I admit, but I'm a "proper Net user." In certain circles, goatsex is famed. Arse, and I've just visited the Stileproject, and it brought up a porn pop-up. Now there is something you want 8 year-old children looking at. It seems to me, and I at least admit this is conjecture, that what you object to is allowing normal people to have access to a service which keeps children from looking at some pretty unpleasant things (goatsex, rotten.com), whilst providing an environment in which they can learn, both about the world and the Internet and might one day allow them a better future. ----------

	And another one... (3.00 / 2) (#19)
	by Wiggy on Thu Aug 23rd, 2001 at 07:05:24 AM PST

	This is starting to get tedious, but I have an hour to kill, and there are some interesting points here: First off, I would like to know what it is with you and crack... Fully 1/3 of your comments reference crack in some way. Do YOU have some (maybe subconcious) desire to experiment with this drug? Also, why do all of your references to crack imply crack makes you post unconventional ideas? Do you have some links that prove that (use of) crack and posting alternative viewpoints are cause and effect? 1/3rd of my posts? As of when you wrote that, that would be ... two posts ... OK. I don't touch drugs full stop, and the phrase 'are you smoking Crack?' is used in Manchester, UK, at least amongst my friends at least to say something along the lines of 'the only way I can imagine a mature, intelligent person such as yourself, would make such a stupid assertion is if you were on mind-bending substances'. You also have to realise that Manchester has a crack problem (along with almost every other drug), and quite often the intention of asking the question is to raise a laugh. I have no evidence that the use of this drug makes an individual have stupid ideas, or say/write stupid things, but I would suggest that if you are taking crack on a regular basis, your own stupidity is inherently implied. Who acknowledges this? You? By your own admission "I haven't been on AOL in five years". Some internet authority? Without reference, this could be a claim by your next-door neighbours cat by screaching at an AOL CD. It's a well kept secret, but a lot of providers pay a huge amount of money to be indepentantly tested for performance. These reports are expensive, and copyright, but allows an ISP manager to know where he fits in within the industry - when you buy the reports, you can pay extra and see other tested companies results as well. In addition, user reports in groups such as alt.internet.providers.uk can give a good indication of how an ISP is 'behaving' - not just in performance, but in reliability, usefullness of support staff, etc. In all of these forums/'tests' AOL performs well under average. In addition, in terms of value, it's considered by most 'power users' to be poor. For a more balanced and upbeat review conducted back in 1999 you can take a look here - however, since that review many people have complained that performance has dropped massively. Please post or link to the AOL marketing strategy that specifically states this. Otherwise this conjecture merely shows that you object to a firm making money from its products. I hate to break this to you - AOL don't put their marketing strategy up on the Net for everybody to read. You see, it's a secret, as it is with every other company. I don't object to them making money, but I do object to the way in which they make it, and their stance towards open platforms, the abscence of which would mean they wouldn't even have a business today. I've got to say that most of the RFCs I've read aren't exactly light reading. And why should I know SMTP codes to be allowed to email? You shouldn't - my point was that you should not undervalue those people who do the work behind the scenes to make all this stuff work. The fact that the Internet is as integrated and strong a platform as it is today is because there are idiots like me out here, who can't get a girlfriend, and spend their lives trying to improve this technology for your use. The original post was in part, an attack on this culture, and further in the paragraph I suggest that because the author does not understand this stuff, he is venting a little too much anger. Your personal experience may not be indicative of the rest of the world, you know. A quick search of one of our company databases throws up nearly 70 AOL email addresses, all businesses Agreed, but what are those 70 as a percentage? If it was 70%, I'd shut up, but I'm guessing it isn't... Arse and I've just visited the Stileproject, and it brought up a porn pop-up. Now there is something you want 8 year-old children looking at. Yeah. Should have warned you about that. Stileproject is not a site to be looking at from work. That site however, is the antithesis again, of what AOL stands for. As are all the other sites I mentioned, for different reasons. They are 'famed', AOL is not. AOL may be a house-hold name, and those sites are not. It's all about context and culture again, really. Anyway, the point I was trying to make was that AOL is not 'famed' for the values the author suggested. It's famed for being full of people who are going to write long, offensive pieces about how great AOL is. I just thought I would write a long, offensive piece about how flawed the logic was. You know, ying and yang and all that. :-)

	Haven't used it in five years? An expert then? (5.00 / 2) (#16)
	by elenchos on Wed Aug 22nd, 2001 at 06:05:22 AM PST

	On the one hand, we have the incontrovertible proof that AOL is the most popular product since the Pill. On the other hand, you have a few fanboys on hax0r sites badmouthing their service. Are you aware that I get virtually ZERO dropped connections from AOL today? Who cares what problems you had five years ago. You go make friends with a normal person, and then see if they will let you in their house long enough to see AOL in action. You'll be switching in a heartbeat. And not just for the connection quality. It is the premium content. Content the likes of which you can't even DREAM of! Again, you haven't seen it in five years (or 35 years in Internet Time), yet you deem yourself qualified to write 1200-word criticisms of it? How can you be such an expert in an online service you don't use? Do you realize what that says about your credibility? Contrast that with the Adequacy staff, who are virtually all AOL users, and have been since Day One. Of course, seeing the obscene and offensive remarks you make about the author's sexuality and body parts even, I guess that is to be expected. I suspect you learned to say things like that at one of the unsupervised children's sites like Slashdot. Let me be the first to tell you that when you crawl up out of the gutter and attempt to interact with we grownups here on the real Internet, that kind of bathroom talk is simply not acceptable. You will find that if you are unable to conduct yourself in a civilized manner, you will be cast back into the slime pit that taught you such disrespectful behavior. You need to get yourself an AOL account today, to find out what you've been missing. And you need to wash your mouth out with soap, too, my friend. Shame on you! I do, I do, I do --Bikini Kill

	AOL, Idiocy Online (none / 0) (#24)
	by Anonymous Reader on Mon Jan 14th, 2002 at 08:26:36 PM PST

	AOL got millions of Americans online, yes. This is, however, not a good thing. If you haven't noticed, the majority of those millions are complete idiots. Every 28 year old woman who has no idea about computer wants to have a come page, and so the internet is riddled with horrid places like angelfire and geocities. In 7 years online I've found a total os 5 places online that weren't populated almost entirely with complete idiots or 12 year old losers who think they look cool when they type like: "wat r u talkin bout? luv u, l8" ... and this site is not one of those places. I, for one, think the world would be eternally more likable if every single user of AOL died in an excruciatingly painful manner right now. Oh, the users of CompuServ, MSN, and Prodigy as well.

	Uhh....? (none / 0) (#25)
	by Anonymous Reader on Fri May 31st, 2002 at 06:56:48 PM PST

	There isn't anti-AOL propaganda plastered all over the net for no reason at all. AOL stinks, and I don't think anyone needs to prove it--it's just self evident.