AOL: The Rise and Fall of the First Internet Empire
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AOL was one of the early pioneers of the Internet in the mid-1990s, and the most recognized brand on the web in the U.S
It originally provided a dial-up service to millions of Americans, as well as providing a web portal, e-mail, instant messaging and later a web browser following its purchase of Netscape. At the height of its popularity, it purchased the media conglomerate Time Warner in the largest merger in U.S. history. AOL rapidly declined thereafter, partly due to the decline of dial-up to broadband.
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My wife still uses an AOL email address. I like to think that every time she logs on a light comes on in their headquarters and the one guy still working there puts the noose away for another day.
EdgedShadow lmfaooooo
EdgedShadow I am still using my aol email Address
ahaha gold
I lol'd
lol, I still use it too. Its my main email, the other ones I use for signing up for crap I really dont want....
man I remember getting so excited when I dialled up to get into the Internet. it was like opening a portal to go into a brave new world.
ryan cliff I myself remember my first foray into the unknown expanse of the Internet, thanks to an AOL "free sample" disc & a phone line. And to think I witnessed it's evolution from dial-up to Cable Internet.
werd, after school our friends would like run home to get on computer and talk and then i found the internet. I remember using those discs as coasters.
ryan cliff We used to get excited watching the three icons coming on the screen of the little guy then hearing YOU GOT MAIL!!!! AOL used to be the bomb!!!! Kids today would laugh
The good old days
I would beat off for days to all the free internet porn...like a kid in a candy store.
Ping : "You Got Mail." What an iconic sound byte of history...!!!
I loved the ping "you got mail" from aol. I wish aol was still in business only with wifi. I learned how to use the Internet and email on aol. The interface was user friendly. Everything I needed was on aol. In many ways, I miss it.
To me didnt sound. ¿only works when contact is from aol too?
I still use that for when I get a text message. 😁
Other than the Windows 98 boot up sound, "you've got mail" is the tech sound of all history
So iconic you misquoted it. :P
Who remembers when you'd see those damn aol discs EVERYWHERE...
Walmart HA HA HA
My mom's 90 year old patient even got a CD!!
@@luv2cruise80 We had a CD and Walmart had them hanging everywhere around the registers,we had to get our desk top computer back up one time and a guy told us to get the AOL disk and re do it or something.
@@marksreviewsandrants8554 I dont remember many Walmart's in the 90s
@@luv2cruise80 Really?We always went in the 80's but then they did not have grocery's just dry goods.
I remember when my uncle was an electrician in '97 and AOL still outsourced modem installations. There was a period of a few months where he was installing so many modems that he had to employ my brother and me full time just to meet the demand!
Those were the days!
Sir Alfred Powell did you make good dough?
Whatastic You bet your a** we did. I was making 800 bucks/day off the books.
lightning storms where good money for computer shops back then too!
late 90's were a great time.
I remember using Juno's free internet CD to get completely free internet. After the trial period would expire, I'd uninstall whatever the hell got me online and reinstalled it again - BAM, free internet.
But, for the performance and efficiency and the hugely reduced costs of mechanical HDDs, broadband became the most optimal choice.
"WOULD YOU GET OFF THE PHONE! I'M TRYING TO USE THE INTERNET!"
Kids today will never understand lol, internet so slow it takes a whole minute to download one picture smh LOL.
96NightRider96 man what hell
96NightRider96 ah the good old days, playing Infantry Online and having to watch the clock so my dad wouldn't freak out when the phone bill arrived
96NightRider96 I remember when someone called and kicked you off, so annoying!
Don't get me started on videos.......
I once had to wait 5-6 hours for 30+ minute to load/buffer.
I miss the 90’s just enough tech to be satisfied, but not enough to be absorbed in it 24/7.
Underrated comment. It was a perfect balance, even most of the early 2000s as well
exactly. it was just right.
Such an imperfect comment for the young kids/virgins these days.
Now it's ridiculous
I always say the 90s is where we peaked...everything we need but not in excess
I miss that creaky door opening & closing letting you know people are on
I remember having AOL for nearly a year for free... every time I called up to cancel they would offer me a free month... every single time...for 11 months straight. On the 12th month they finally gave up lol.
AOL's customer retention department had more saves than Brendan Holtby.
i dont blame him,crazy expensive world we live in
i did that too lol
I had AOL for free for a year with a computer I bought, and after the free membership expired, I kept trying to cancel and they just kept giving me 3 months more of membership, like every time!
They wanted to get you hooked, but it didn't work with you... with most it did =))
almost 19yrs ago i found my wife on AOL. They had a dating channel called @AOL Love. 3kids later and still together
Why the fuck do you need 3 kids man? We are reeling from overpopulation
Mr.Sceptic Buzz off, idiot.
That's such a sweet story! God bless you and your lovely family :)
Dwight Hollis awesome
Dwight Hollis god bless you man. I got all these damn apps and shit and I still can't get a text back.....
I was honestly shocked when I heard even in 2009 they had 5 million subscribers.
Older people who didn't understand that AOL wasn't 'the internet'. It would often take me half an hour or more to explain how the connection worked. THen they would ask me if Netscape was 'the internet'. Then was 'internet explorer' the internet. THey thought every different browser was a separate internet. Drove me nuts.
I didn't even know that AOL dialup still existed in 2009, LOL.
One time, back in 1998, me being 7. I forgot to log off of AOL, and it ran for 8 Hours over night. RIP my phone bill.
Did you dial long distance for dial up? Usually it would sign you off for inactivity
I would also not disconnect the line when I was downloading mp3z that would take all fucking night to download.
@@ramade9040 my bill was $300 /mo, plus getting extra phone /fax line so the being online didnt tie up the phone,or get thrown off when phone rang.
*Hey we're 30 now. My family got internet when I was 11.*
Before MySpace and Facebook, there was AOL and chat rooms. RIP AOL chat rooms! Had lots of fun and met great people.
Before texting really. Texting was the death of AOL more than social media.
Aol chatrooms were the real OG
Chat rooms also gave rise to trolls, I do remember the chat room days, but I had NetScape not AOL.
Slingo :(
those chat rooms were awesome.
Those were the days! AOL chat rooms. Just talking to someone online was amazing.
ASL?
Yeah it sure was --- ASL was the best way to start a conversation with a girl and later that night you might be getting sex :-)
Some people still say ASL drives me crazy
will edwards- ah, because you could.
I remember sneaking to read my AOL mail at work and that damn voice saying out loud "You've Got Mail". Busted by the whole office.
Its that high screeched sound when connecting to the internet. I was so excited like please work, please work...
DOPAMINE
It all ends with an incoming phone call so I got call waiting and then parents' friends would complain to parents that your phone line is always busy lol
It's sad how some people are still paying for AOL because they believe that is the only way they can use the internet. My buddy's grandfather still pays for it and we tried explaining things to him but he wouldn't listen. But I will give them props for still holding on to my 5th grade e-mail account!
RedTeamReview i know that's not posed to be funny but I laughed because I know how stubborn the elderly can be
Some places in the world, and maybe even the United States, still cannot use broadband or dsl because there isn't an infrastructure set up for it. That's why dial up still exists.
RedTeamReview The most pathetic are the people who pay (or used to pay) for AOL + a broadband Internet subscription. What's the point?
My family paid for both. But during the time of the merger AOL/Timer Warner. AOL was only $5 a month when you got Road Runner with it. Another reason was during that time, if you left AOL, you would lose your email account. And some people who had important information emailed to them did not want to lose their email. During those times, the internet was a mess. You could easily find porn searching for Dish ware. AOL also had a pretty good parental control software for younger kids. AOL also had the biggest social media following during the time. When time warner split from AOL. That's when things fell apart. Instant Messenger became stand alone, you could keep your email account without subscription and thats when there really was no reason to keep it. Facebook and Myspace became bigger for social media, mozilla and eventually chrome improved on parental control, etc.
There are a lot of things AOL had that made it worth keeping. Their multiplayer community was pretty decent too. They had popular games such as Ultima Online at one point. Of course over time it became pointless, but during the early ages of broadband, there were good reasons to keep AOL.
I know right. AOL was the first community for picking up chicks.
i miss aol talking to people in the chat rooms and hearing them open and close the door on your buddy list.
Mike O'Driscoll buddy lists were awesome
@@kreativkeem6864
Yes lol
@jwathas did he ask?
Hey what are you wearing right now? What's on your mind? Or maybe, wanna cyber?
The sound effects on AOL were so iconic and inspired, weren't they? The fact everyone remembers them so much and with a mix of fondness and frustration is extraordinary.
When tryna download your favorite song on a 56k modem took like 8 hours and it ended up beeing a fake ass song or it wouldnt even work. Lol
and unknowingly, you welcomed Termites into your PC... thanks Bearshare/kazaa/limewire
i remember having a 56k connection and i purposely downloaded some freeware "internet booster" program, which made the jpeg images on websites look terrible (or you could choose to not even load them), and surprisingly it actually worked, and sped up my load times by about 75% :D
LimeWire, AKA, the best place to contract viruses and download 6 different covers or horrible versions of our favorite songs before finally finding the right one.
@@brittneybabeee4031 Yea but that moment you found the right one... Bliss!
That's what you get for stealing music.
You forgot to mention the famous or infamous AOL chat rooms.
I actually liked those. You could join in on any conversation topic, fishing, hunting, dancing, traveling,
home building, school, music, politics, and on and on. You could even start your own chat topic.
You were with people sharing similar interests, therefore it was pretty much a friendly place,
unlike what we have today with bickering, trolling, and name calling. Almost everything is political today
and we're all, most certainly, divided there. . . Except here, of course. Everyone here is very friendly. : )
When chat rooms were basically safe and mostly filled with normal people. No kink. Humane conversation.
AOL jack off rooms. A/S/L EVERBODY A/S/L DOES ANYONE WANT TO CYBER. I WANNA CYBER ABOUT TO STICK MY PENIS IN THE PORT 2 HOLE.
Progz always flooding the rooms
John Dough 😂😂😂
Glad I'm not the only one giving AOL a retrospective lately, it's a fascinating story that deserves telling :)
I swear, when you posted a video on AOL I had a mini heart attack :X
Your take was awesome though, much more thorough and in-depth!
Haha, yeah no doubt it was coincidence, I know how long stuff like this can take. I'd been working on my AOL video off and on for like six months.
So true! Another good read is the rise and fall of graphics card manufacturer 3dfx, and the practically flamboyant history and relationship between AMD and Intel.
You missed an important chapter in AoL.
In the early 2000s the AoL instant messenger was HUGE as in as big as twitter is now. There were way more AoL instant messenger users than the AoL service itself. Again they had a second near monopoly and blew it. The AoL instant messenger didn't peak in popularity until 2008 or so and then it crashed hard after that.
Ive never seen such a positive relationship amongst youubers. Im subscribing to both pages!
I first logged on to AOL in 1996, just right after I purchased my first Internet capable computer. People make fun of AOL now, but at the time, it opened a new world of endless possibilities for me. I stuck with them until around 2000 or so when broadband became available in my area.
+Game Wizard Yeah, people forget that there were a *lot* of areas that didn't have access to any ISPs at all. That was the main reason I went with AOL. I had an ISP in one place I lived, but when we moved, AOL was literally all that was available in that area.
Same exact time table as me.
My AOL email addresses still work 😃 and stopped paying 20 years ago.
Mine too! Lol
My mum still uses hers 😂
@@MrJJuK They still be happy doing some free data mining.
Yep, same for me.
My parents also still have their aol email account. I also thought it was free anyways.
I remember being in school, talking about which dial in phone numbers were working the best. the good ol days. Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 3 was usually the one that held you in suspense.
they were so successful at marketing that growing up as a kid, I literally thought that AOL was THE internet and the only way to access the world wide web. lol
Ha! I thought I was the only one.
I remember they littered the world with their setup floppies and then eventually CDs.
I thought the same! I bet if I go thru boxes in storage I'd find like a few hundred of their discs.
Even here in Australia people mixed up AOL the Wen & the Internet all the time right up to the early to mid 2000's
same, I was so confused when i went to a friends house, and she just went to her internet explorer browser
i was a postal worker at the time when those AOl CDs were being mailed out and the sheer numbers of them in the mail was staggering and annoying, 95% of people who received them never used them except as from drink coasters
my friends and I would throw them like ninja stars at each other.
siamiam in elementary school they had those Harry Potter themed AOL disks and I cut them up and made them into name place holders for my birthday party.
siamiam Those AOL CD-ROMs were in almost every magazine too. The last AOL CD-ROM I got in the mail was in 2006. It was fun cutting it into a spiral.
The diminishing return on an advertising budget does not prevent the manager of advertising from thinking up ways to spend it. Once he saw the overload problem he should have cut her budget and expanded his server base, then found something useful to put on them.
That is exactly what Apple did. It was unbelievable that the largest media company in the world couldn't sell music or videos to save their life.
We just stacked ours and wanted to see how big we could make the stack. We got one in the mail almost every month, was hilarious. I'd always cancel service and just use a new CD every time I wanted free internet.
It was AOL that got me into my life long affair with the Internet.
I will never forget the days of hearing those phone noises when I logged on.
Nowadays, my Internet is now high-speed Cable. Kids nowadays don't realize how hard it was during the dark age of Dial-Up Internet.
The 80s and 90s we're golden
Everything from your younger years seems golden. Or funny as hell. Or tragic or embarrassing. The 80's...only us punk rockers had Krazy Kolor hair (brand name). Now every huge SJW has blue hair. Ruined the whole thing.
Ok millenial
90s SHOULD’VE NEVER EXISTED😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡
@@80sDecadeCanYouPleaseComeBack this comment makes no sense
Pretty sure those "new subscribers" were the same people who made new accounts to get free internet lol
Guilty. I was one of those. I would always make a new account every few months, with randomly made numbers as credit card. It sometimes worked up to six months in order to get a new free AOL internet access. It was the years between 2000-2004
Waryaa Wariiri imagine paying for e-mail acsess
those cd's were fun to throw at each other
Exactly. AOL was the best frisbee producer!
Admiralex91 yeah
Like ninja stars....ROFL
LOL
Oh hell yeah, I'd throw them at my dad all the time
That was a nightly occurrence at my house in the 90s! My parents were constantly yelling at me to "get off the computer" because they either wanted to make a call or were expecting a call! They finally caved and had a second phone line installed!
yelling at Kent and Halloween 🎃🤣😂😳😍😅🎃🤣😂😳😍😅🎃🤣😂😳
l remember anyone that you will never know 💯or emergency alert 📢🤔😏💯🤷😕📢🤔😏💯 phone 📱 new phone very well so I them all set up text messages
Now if only we can get Comcast to fail. I hate those thieving bastards. Every time I move ( I move a lot because of work ) they magically forget to cancel my service and bill me twice. When I try to call them and dispute the charges, they make me wait hours. I was a kid when AOL existed, but my family used MSN Dial Up. I remember getting the CDs in the mail though.
Comcast is such an evil company. Not only do they way over charge you, but when you call them and threaten to leave, you all of a sudden "qualify" for a special pricing package that cuts your bill way down with just as many if not more channels. Goes to show you what ripoffs they are. Yes, I hope they go down, too.
My monthly Comcast bill for television, internet, and telephone is $272. Luckily I don’t pay for it, another family member does. I would never pay that much money if it were up to me. I can see why so many people are cutting the cord. I would only pay for Internet access and maybe Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime if I were paying the bills. Comcast and Netflix are a total ripoff.
I used to use AT&T Worldnet back when narrowband Internet was the way to go. AOL was never really used other than free trials in my house back then.
I have no nice words for Comcast. Just ditched them for ATT fiber gig speed. I would explain the process of why we left them but they are not worth my keystrokes. In short, we had upgraded to gig speed and the service kept cutting out 2-3 times an hour and resetting and they’d say our speed looks good what’s the problem. I could go on but it’s TLDR material and we all know how shitty Comcast is so....
Verizon billed me twice in a month. They didn't fix my issue. I'm switching to tmobile. This was the 3rd issue I had with Verizon & they're a evil company.
@@Mark-sj3xb right huh 🤔
Sending out floppy disks was still a great idea. Optical drives were still a rarity even in 1995. Floppy drives could be found on desktops manufactured in the early 2000s.
I know dell was still making computers with floppy drive up to around 2008. It's like cars with a cassette deck in the mid 2000s
Macs had optical drives in 1995 and even earlier. Mine from 1996 did (and still had floppies). Apple got rid of floppies by 1998 with the new iMacs.
I worked there during its most explosive growth period, when they went to unlimited pricing. It was definitely an interesting experience, and the company's culture was one that I truly enjoyed. I have fond memories of talking to customers while tossing a Koosh ball back and forth to a friend who was several cubicle rows away.
Ultimately once they went unlimited pricing and everyone got busy signals, I went from a valued tech who could diagnose problems to just a warm body to be yelled at. Hold times were horrid. The *average* hold time was 45 minutes. And imagine, a person picked up the phone already pissed off at the company. Imagine how exponentially more enraged they were after being on hold that long.
This was about January of 1997. The most common question was "When will it be fixed?" I was essentially told to lie to the customer, in not so many words. I had to use phrases like "Soon." and "They are working on it." and "It is our top priority!" The reality was, and I knew it at the time, was that nothing was likely to change until June of that same year. So, at *least* 6 months out, bare minimum.
I disliked being a warm punching bag for all the furious customers, where I was only able to flex my support skills maybe 5% of the time. I didn't enjoy that at all and didn't stay with the company for too much longer after that.
I have some hilarious memories of a few customer interactions. I made a lot of friends there. I enjoyed the culture. I was grateful for the skills I learned there and have applied what I've learned in my career path since. While I ultimately didn't like what happened to me there, I will always cherish the positives that came from it.
RonJomero still in the same business now??
Adam Rankin not quite, but I'm still working in technology. a lot of the basics I learned there I have utilized in my career path.
Good post. Thanks for the insider perspective.
RonJomero have any of the AOL staff gone on to work for the new big tech companies... FB, Google etc?
Not that I am aware from that particular group of friends/coworkers. Though I did make a lot of friends in that same industry, and some of them work for places like Microsoft, Netflix, and even Nest.
REPLY
I remember being at one of my wealthier friends houses back in '01 or '02 and her parents had broadband which totally blew my mind. I had never before been outside of the walled garden of AOL. Crazy how times have changed.
This was really great. Thank you!
I live it when the videos are organized, straight to the point, and trimmed to be short
I have good memories. This was before everybody having a cell phone was standard, so logging on and seeing a friend online on the messenger was "magical" :-)
ASL?
an asshole.
Anybody else remember being more then happy to get free high quality floppy disk's from AOL just to format and reuse?...
ya, my employer at the time.
@@EINSTEIN2LESS3ISME lol hahahahaha
I thought I was the only one!!!
@@c.cokernator4726
Yes I remember that to.
We had so many cds i remember my friend use to paste 2 together lable sides in get a chain and wear as a necklace..the 90s
I remember getting the AOL CD in the mail as a kid. The internet was so exciting at the time lol
the late 90s on AOL...the internet back then was just magical
lethrneck4 yes it was not controlled then now days when y won’t to sign up for someone’s news letter Facebook comes asking are y sure y won’t to do that crazy alp is controlled like every one else and so are the users sad very sad
It sure was. I miss that time, I love the nostalgia.
OK boomer
@@vimalcurio boomers invented everything you use today..your generation hasn’t invented anything except blaming another generation for your. Lack of mattering ..and I say this as a Gen Xer..
@@lethrneck4 we're and we'll
AOL died for many reasons. One was its' restricted nature. You couldn't install Napster or IRC and use them over the internet. What really killed AOL in the end was broadband - but its' restrictive nature was a MAJOR component!
The guides kept banning customers. Good riddance to aol.
I do remember seeing plenty of people with IPT aol hostmasks on IRC back during its heyday. Of course nearly all of the aol users we had in our channels had bad reputations for trolling, flaming, and flooding channels.
What are u talking about? I had AOL and had no problem running Napster or IRC. AOL was even good for gaming. A lot of people said it sucked but I had much better connection playing Quake 2 and Counterstrike on AOL than Earthlink, and Earthlink was supposedly a great gaming ISP
There was another mistake they made. When they bought Time Warner, they had the Time Warner cable service. That would have given them access to their broadband network, & in markets where they had Time Warner Cable, AOL would have been able to integrate their broadband network into their service. They chose not to do that. They have themselves to blame for that.
Kids these days will never know the struggle
Black Hammer so true well said
Oh god yes; spending hours on a Saturday night trying to log into AOL only to be met with busy signal.. oh the pain!
If they did, or struggle would be worthless.
Its the same with every generation. The early struggle, so later, they do not have to.
A single 53 second porn video might take a whole night to download and failed like 65% of the time. When you got something, it was GLORIOUS. T3 connections were God
TRUE i ALSO REMEMBER THE TONE. MAKES IT NOSTALGIC
I use to love AOL chat rooms. They messed up when they didn't switch to DSL, people didn't want slow dial up connection. Constantly busy line or got disconnected time after time.
I find it so neat that my mom still uses her aol email, I never thought much of it when I was little, but knowing what aol is nowadays it feels so interesting to me
I remember collecting dozens of those AOL CDs because I ate a lot of honey nut cheerios as a kid
Funny and backs up the story!
Harry Garris me too
YOUVE GOT MAIL
Thumbs up if you remember NetZero or Juno.
NetZero is still around.
Yeah, but it's not the same ad-supported ISP it used to be.
They still have dial up as well as DSL and wireless. And their home page is full of ads. I still use my email account with them.
StarInbound Back when it was new, it was completely free. But you had to install a toolbar that would show an ad before connecting. That's the NetZero I miss. Haha
Robin Williams I had Juno's dialup service. The time it took to connect the internet I could cook and eat a meal--and clean the dishes.
I remember getting TOS’d from AOL chatrooms so many times that I got my family’s account suspended. 1994 edge lord.
We got kicked off and my grandma called AOL and the guy told her word for word every gruesome thing i said in a chat room and i got in trouble
There was always a prissy teen girl threatening, 'TOS!'
AOHell anyone? lol
I Got Called An Edgelord In The 2000 AOL Chatrooms I'm Like Do You Know What That Freaking Means Genius?
I really miss AOL. The aesthetic, the convenience, everything. Email, IM, chat, and the whole world wide web all in one convenient little window.
We never paid for AOL. We just went to Publix and got another magazine with the aol free trial when it was up
quepiid lol same here !!
Wow that's hilarious
Same here, those disc were EVERYWHERE! Lol
@@abelflexes2 right huh 🤔 huh 🤔 huh 🤔 remember aol mail
I remember getting all excited when an AOL update cane out so I could see the new design scheme and features.
Flashback 1998 You've Got Mail; Meg Ryan - Tom Hanks.
Great video! I knew AOL had a crazy marketing campaign since I saw them EVERYWHERE while growing up, but I didn't realize to the extent of how big their marketing campaign was.
you've got mail..that voice still stuck in my head from good old days of DIAL UP when I had AOL ! LUL
Then you can add your name and it would say it too! Made me feel loved lol
@@alphadragon7645
Haha yes I miss those days lol.
See the movie Her about a guy who has a relationship with his OS (operating system). Gonna happen sooner than we will be ready for. Where's Stephen King when you need him?
@@frankbartol3196
Like Maximum Overdrive but the electronics take over.
This video really made me feel my age. I was one of the first million on the internet, before AOL or CompuServe. It was my job to investigate it for a local government as it was being developed. The real systems people didn't care about it or care to learn about it and I was just an administrator. I started using it so early that I ended up being a beta tester for the very first Internet Explorer. LOL. Damn, I am old, I keep forgetting that. Maybe because I am old. LOL. It doesn't seem that long ago; but, my children were just kids and we were the only ones that had an internet connection. My personal home connection was to a server that a couple of guys from NASA had set up in their garage, literally. I was the first to configure Internet Explorer for them because people only used Mosaic and later, Netscape. I started with Mosaic at home and as soon as I was testing it, I switched to Internet Explorer. The earliest internet was so barren of anything worthwhile. People with special interests gathered on bulletin boards that you had to dial into directly. Eventually I went to CompuServe, never liked AOL, it was too cartoonish. I remember when they first let you order pizza online, that was a big deal at the time. Amazing to see that others see this all as ancient history now.
A really cool compilation - WOW!
I started coding with the Commodore Vic 20 and PET in 1985. Your video was like reliving the old days...
Thanks for this very informative presentation.
At 6:06 that sound STILL makes the hair on my neck bristle. I was astonished at how that simple sound is so embedded with the sense of discontent and even a kind of dread I'd get when I heard it....also that sense of impending something's about to happen that the little dial up connection and the icons with it culminating with "you've got mail!" which was pretty exciting back when you were a young person. Like getting a toy in the mail 6 weeks after you ordered it, wrapped in a brown box or envelope with YOUR OWN NAME on it, like a real person! (I think too of Steve Martin in "The Jerk" getting so excited over his name in the phone book)
AOL Chat rooms were like tinder in the 90s - ASL?
500/hermaphrodite/Hell
I loved trolling people who did that.
Wanna cyber?
32/F/USA
Real talk. And then if you actually hit it off you'd both lie to each other's friends about how you met
WeizHerGigBuddy It was great, talking on boards about more than what the topic was (music, for example).
I used AOL from 94 to 97. Online chat was a new phenomena and a blast but it got it old. Eventually, I wasn't using ANY of the AOL features other than the internet connection and email--plus I was constantly exceeding the 5 hours monthly limit so I dropped them for a direct connect / (almost) unlimited provider called CCNet (which no longer exists as it was in 97--but I think there are other companies with that name now) Any way, when I called to cancel I was directed to a "specialist" who spent a good 10-15 minutes trying to sell me on staying with AOL. He even told me they offered a direct connect and unlimited option and I was like "WTF...you don't tell anyone that unless they're trying to leave??" and said "I'm done, sorry". I think I had CCnet until 99 when Comcast finally offered cable in my area and that's my story that no one asked to hear, yay!
I remember AOL was what we used for our very first computer... I was like 5. Then, after that computer stopped working, our grandpa gave us one of his old ones (he was very into computers) with a different dial-up service which was worse than AOL. Last night, I had a dream that I was back in the 90s and using AOL. I miss the old days
I enjoyed this factual presentation so much I subscribed today!
Holy crap! I grew up with AOL but never knew what happened to it!
My favorite part was when Netscape pooped out Firefox.
I worked for a company which, when it was starting to go downhill, bled staff to Netscape. I went another direction; I always wondered how those guys fared when a couple years later the Netscape bandwagon imploded. Life in silicon valley in the 90s...
NetZero is still around. They still offer dial up and DSL as well as wireless internet. I still use my NetZero email account.
NetZero is still around, but it is no longer free. They should change their name.
Incredible! I appreciate the knowledge. Thank you.
We used to use those disks as frisbees. I remember my friend threw one at the wall by accident and it shattered, immediately apologizing. But then I showed him the stash and then they evolved from frisbees to ninja stars. Good times
1217mikegrs lmao
AOL chat rooms were great for hooking up. Lol the good old days!
OK boomer
@@vimalcurio if your still saying “ok boomer” in 2021 then you need to get a life.
@@Jean_Jacques148 I've life. Do you have?
My husband and I met in an AOL chatroom in the summer of 2000. We have now been together for over 21 years.
I remember AOL would give 1 month free membership. Then make it impossible to cancel your membership.
Wow ! This video brought back some fond memories... I was a good customer for many months. As my skill level increased I began to find AOL restrictive. Remember how they would disconnect you for inactivity ? Well I found a way to stay on for days without being kicked off!
Bearshare, Napster were fantastic. Some of the chat rooms were great, met some nice people there. After a while I quit talking to people that I did not personally know through IM (Instant Message?) You could run into some unstable people at times...
I'm drunk but this video was amazing.
No shit, I'm here now and in the same boat. LOL
I'm amazing but this video was drunk.
@@paulaharrisbaca4851 🤣
@@hidereplies1425 I'm buzzed, but might watch it again later when I'm drunk lol.
im late but drunk as well
There are a number of factual misstatements in this video and a few major points that were glossed over (probably in the interest of brevity) that were too important to miss. Specifically, the pre-Internet era of AOL's success such as chat rooms and Instant Messenger and the fact that the Internet was initially a THREAT to their business model as a closed online service. No one ever charged for the connection software. The software was always free but AOL revolutionized getting the software in the hands of the people and the disks and discs of the time had a perceived value because each was like a coupon that gave you credits against your account that added up to free access time. As soon as anyone copied them, they changed the game and went to monthly. It is true that the system overloaded at one point but AOL defined itself by shutting the whole service off and rebuilding the whole network. It was a do or die moment in the company's history and at the time it was an example of a great company really listening to its customers, caring about the user experience, and investing intelligently into its future growth. The company never showed more leadership than at that moment. AOL was never meant to be an online access provider, although that is how most of the world remembers it. AOL as an ISP was already the beginning of the end. It's glory days were when it ran a mini-Internet of its own. Imagine an Internet that had one owner, where ever advert, everything you buy, ever dollar you transact all goes to and through one house -- that was AOL in it's prime. And they bested every competitor UNTIL The Internet came along. They just couldn't compete with free. Suddenly they couldn't do multi-million dollar media deals with major brand names, they couldn't compete with cut-rate ISPs, and when broadband came around, their enormous investment in dial-up technology became a liability instead of an asset. Overall, the story was generally correct but candidly you missed the key things that made AOL great and the key events that made AOL fail. When it merged with Time Warner, it was already trying to pivot to a whole new model but they picked the wrong partners with Time Warner. Had they gone with a younger less stayed bunch that would have experimented with new technology, it is likely we would have had something marvelous. At the time, we were talking about convergence between television and the Internet, with e-commerce based home shopping channels, movies on demand, interactive programming, screen to screen video conferencing. The vision was ahead of its time but they needed a media partner that was going to back it and unfortunately Time Warner did not care one bit. It is strange to hear you say that AOL was the Godfather of the Internet because The Internet is what killed AOL. EVERYTHING that happened since they pivoted to being a newbie's onramp to the Internet was a pivot from their glory days and they never really recovered. I believe had Steve Case brought his reboot to a better merger candidate, they would have been the Google of our times. In many ways, Google and Facebook put together are the Internet equivalents of AOL. In fact, I think it is more accurate to say that AOL is the Godfather of Facebook. AOL in its prime was the Facebook of its day. Facebook for all intents and purposes is an online service that happens to ride on top of the Internet.
Thanks for the insights! Having an insider's perspective has definitely made the whole thing clearer; you're correct that I cut out a ton of explanations for the sake of not making a 20 minute video, but I had definitely missed some of the points you brought up in your analysis. I appreciate you taking the time to write this up! I wish I had access to primary sources like that; it'd make these videos that much more interesting.
Thank you for your thoughtful and candid response. I appreciate that more than words can express. Perhaps when the world learns more about Oath (Verizon's "Frankenstein Advertising Monstrosity" comprised of the combination of Yahoo! and AOL), this video will merit a follow-up. I'd be very happy to offer whatever insights I can if that is of any interest including pointing you to direct sources. I've often wondered what would've happened if Steve Case picked a different merger candidate that genuinely embraced what he had in mind. If you are interested at all in why he thought Time Warner was a good choice, look to the fascinating original story of HBO (Home Box Office). One could soundly argue that we have HBO to thank (or to blame) for the existence and proliferation of cable television. I believe Case saw parallels between HBO's and AOL's origin stories and thought the combination would make sense. Case should have taken AOL to Barry Diller, who is one of the only other people on planet Earth who got what made AOL special at the time. It was NEVER as a dial-up Internet onramp. It was in the pre-Internet days as a walled garden online service. Think iTunes and Apple App Store and Gmail and SnapChat combined. Amazingly, Diller made many overtures to TimeWarner but his offers fell on deaf ears. He tried as recently as 2007. Here's a link to an article where he affirmed his interest (Ad Age link: goo.gl/aHSy1M ). I believe AOL would have been absorbed into what is now IAC ( Wikipedia link: goo.gl/Fgwb5q ). TimeWarner completely missed the chance to ride that wave. AOL is a shell of a shell of its former self and there is not one remnant left now of what made it such a great company. But I just hope your viewers understand that the days of AOL as an ISP were NOT it's glory days. A video paralleling its services at the time and how they weren't building block for the Internet at all but more like foreshadow to the future Internet that established consumer interest and fueled the commercial potential of what followed. Thanks again for your response and this progressive exchange. I was not a subscriber when I posted my initial comment but I've just added a Like and I subscribed (with notifications on). I look forward to your future videos.
Robert J. Holtz
Nerd alert (sorry had to say it)
AOL was doomed when the switch away from dial-up occurred. NOTHING could save them and good riddance.
Jake G.....
"Nerd alert" lol
Even funnier.....lacks basic grammar school skills to create paragraphs. lol
I find the history of these early tech companies so interesting. This is a great video. If someone wants even more detail for the Quantum Link, check out "LGR Tech Tales - Quantum Link: AOL Origins".
This is amazing, the more and more I learn about Apple, the more I learn that Steve Jobs likes to work with other Steves, like Steve Wozniak, Steve Case who brought networking and internet to the Apple line of computers, Steve's make things happen :D
That sound at 3:00 is so nostalgic to me. A high schooler at the time sometimes jumping on my fathers' computer to play "Shadows of Yserbius" (sp?). the feels.
It was the AOL floppy discs I got every week that provided "film" for my Sony Mavica camera. I thought it was a great service!
Um, before AOL, there was PRODIGY. In 1988, I went to Washington D.C. to meet with our Prodigy Bulletin Board Users Group and we spent the weekend on the Washington Mall visiting the AIDS QUILT. To this day, that trip changed me and I will never forget that site of seeing so many Memorial Tapestries!
I first got Prodigy in 1994. Wow, it was primitive with its yellow and pink block screen--and hideous to look at now that I think of it. But, it is what got me started. I remember thinking photos were an amazing advancement in 1996. It was so radical I remember thinking that video wouldnt happen for twenty years. Turned out it was 10 years later that I got my first YT access. Amazing to be a part of this history.
I began my Prodigy subscription in Nov of 1992. I remember when the chat rooms began in early 1993, March that I can remember. Stayed with them until early 1997 when AOL began the flat fee $20 now the internet was unlimited. Years later they also met their demise.
I remember Prodigy ! But...to be honest...we had a "home" computer before anyone even knew what a home computer was...my dad worked for the DOD from the 50's...I still get mad when I think that he could have given SOMEONE...ANYONE...a "heads up" and we'd all be rich !!!
I first went on the "internet" using my 1988 Packard-Bell 386SX using Prodigy. If I remember right, it had something to do with Sears?
I loved hearing the dial up sound again I had to replay it at least 3 times I’ve missed that sound
I remember leaving AOL in 1997 when they went to monthly unlimited. We INSTANTLY had a permanent busy signal when they made that change. And you had to go on-line in order to cancel your service! My wife and I were up all night long trying to get through to them on the phone in order to cancel. When we finally got through, they told us to simply go on-line to cancel. DUH! When we said that it was impossible to get on-line, at least they were willing to cancel us over the phone. The internet is so much better now!
WHERE ARE ALL THE PEOPLE THAT WERE IN AOL CHATROOMS WHERE DO YALL CHAT NOW WHERE IS MY MEDIEVAL TAVERN OGS
klui ranu asl mf
THEY ALL WENT TO MSN CHATROOMS, BUT AFTER THAT I DON'T KNOW......................
After that we just died tbh. All different ways.
Ah, those chatrooms, especially the RPing ones. I loved the days of IRC.
IRC is alive and kicking.
i remember when Kmart came out with those free cds for their bluelight service..oh the old days😆
My dad used to yell at me whenever I logged on internet in the middle of night. One time I had to put pillow on the back of my PC to lower the dial up sound but guess what he showed up and smacked me so hard.
Kids these days missed the best part of internet which is 90s era. Sorry kids you wont ever realize how cool the internet was back in the days. No TH-cam, crazy social media outlets but real people.
shut the fuck up
Your dad is an asshole.
having to get off the internet because someone wanted to use the phone or someone was calling..... that was the worst...... sorry but the old internet isn't as cool as you think it is...
The good ol days
@Vyrex420 He's a freakin Milineal and he think's he's all grown up now.
I always wondered what happened to AOL. Thank you for the informative video!
AOL, the only time I ever signed up for automatic monthly payments. When broadband came along and I tried to cancel my account they just gave you the runaround. Finally had to close my bank account to stop them. I know people who still use AOL.
I had Compuserve while in Graduate School from 1989 - 1994. I remember playing with AppleLink for a while, but then added AOL in 1992 because it was what my family was using and I wanted to keep in touch with them from the other side of the country ... and, when Compuserve had problems connecting, I could always use AOL. At first you couldn't send e-mails cross platform, but that changed in about 1993 or so. I'll never forget when the World Wide Web was first opened on AOL ... how that changed everything. The AOL localized chat rooms and discussion forums vanished (almost overnight, it seems) as other online services because more easily available. In the late 1990s I was serving a town-and-country setting where the best dialup connection I had was through AOL's 1-800 number and my 56k modem. If it hadn't been for the monthly subscription price, I would have gone broke. I stopped paying for AOL in 2002, or thereabouts ... I can't remember exactly when. It was right after they allowed one to keep one's email accounts and cancel the pay-for access service. I still have my aol email address, though I haven't used it in ages.
I used a program that created AOL accounts that lasted 3 days. In 1996 AOL fixed that issue and away went free internet. I remember when it was a $6/hr charge to be connected to their access number.
+Account4info Let me guess, AOHell? :)
Wow i cant believe im 28 already 😥 time flys soo fast.. I remember coming home from school and jumping on AIM and a bunch of chat rooms.. Then of course my mother always had to ruin it by sitting on the phone for 8 hours gossiping with her friends about work and what ever else she talked about.. Napster was the shit for music.. I miss the good old days imagine one day this youtube platform will be something we look back at too just as we do Dial Up.. Juno and Netscape was another large internet service back then and they would give me a certain amount of hours free a day online lol
YOUVE GOT MAIL
@@ricardopinto243 right huh 🤔 post congratulations 🎉🍾🎊🎈
What a bunch of memories this brought to me, when I took that CD from my teenage content magazine and put it in my computer for the first time, I couldn't believe I was on internet!! oooh magical times...
I member AOL.
You don't member?
TheTarrMan that busy signal... it's the only thing I remember more than the "you were disconnected from the other players" screen from MarioKart Wii.
ah, I member
ooh i member
You member NetZero? i member.
AOL actually still makes a lot of money from people who were still subscribed from years ago who set up auto pay. As long as you still have your old AOL email address, they still take the money from your bank account even if you have a broadband modem from a completely different service. I think they legally get away with it by providing an optional antivirus program to their users. So that they could say that's the service user's are paying for. The AOL email account itself, is actually supposed to be free, but you have to opt out of the monthly payments by changing certain account settings. I don't remember how to do it right this minute, but there are videos that show you how.
Just two weeks ago my boss discovered he is still getting billed for AOL. He still uses his AOL email exclusively, even for business.
He can cancel the payments and still keep his email address. AOL email is actually free now. There's videos here on TH-cam that explain how to do it. I did it, but I don't remember exactly how. You have to go into the account settings or options section or something.
Melissa0774 yes he did cancel it after he discovered his card was still getting hit
Just change your bank account or tell your bank to stop accepting e-bills from them.
AOL leaves many files scattered about on your computer. You need to go to every folder that says "AOL" and delete these files one by one.
It was down memory lane with AOL. LOL I had to be with the initial group using AOL. Thanks for sharing!
quite fascinating, thank you!!!
It was still by far the best ISP at the time. I tried Compuserv, EarthLink, and MSN (when my AOL account got terminated). Their chat rooms were the best, no other ISP's even compared, and of course there was instant messaging. Even gaming was the best on AOL. I remember playing Quake 2 and Doom on AOL (Before broadband) with less lag than when I had EarthLink, and EarthLink was supposedly a gaming ISP. Piracy was also big on AOL back in the day. Private rooms like server, cerver would constantly serve mp3's and games. Very few people who used AOL back in the day ventured outside their walled garden. There really wasn't any need to. Everything was on AOL.
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I remember receiving those CDs they came in metal boxes sometimes. the fonts and typography was so beautiful that I just kept them but I never used their service.
Those metal boxes made great weed stashes.
For a lot of people that started using the Internet 25 - 30 years ago would definitely tell you that AOL, Prodigy, and/or CompuServe were where a lot of people got their start in terms of surfing.
I still have and use my original AOL email account from 1994. I remember paying for the service hourly and then monthly. What I don’t remember is when they stopped charging for the service. I can’t recall the last time I paid for AOL even though I still use it. AOL is so low key now that some people actually think that my email is fake!
It still warms my heart to see how hated they still are and the company essentially gone. For all the trouble they gave people who tried to cancel, to their poor service, poor CS, etc.
sachelle babbar I'd say they are far from dead but yeah they are nowhere near the Titan they used to be.
AOL prayed on non-tech savvy and the elderly. It's a disgusting business practice that should be frowned upon.They were charging her $7 a month to keep her email address even after she canceled her Internet service with them. I needed to call them four separate times to cancel this service. This is after they had already been doing this for seven years without her knowledge.
who is her
In0chi That sounds bad. The elderly get screwed too often.
Thank you!!! for doing a live narration rather than a robot voice.
Thanks "Business Casual" for this vital information in just 9mins of time. AOL is something very dear to me. Because I worked for this process from India in a call center called SITEL(Mumbai) in the year 2003 (when i was just busy building up my own personality and attracting cheeks...lol).....Never knew these things were happening in those days......Even I used to wonder these days where AOL disappeared. I never bothered to check. I assumed they might have merged with someone bigger and name must have changed. ....Never knew they were struggling.......thanks for all the hardwork. ...atleast I know now what happened to them.......as it was my first job in the call center industry.....
You haven't lived until you have used AOL cd's for drink coasters in your home, it's must be what it feels like to be rich.
tfw my 58 year old mother still uses AOL as her main browser.
Does she still have the AOL client ?
As a kid I remember arranging to meet up with my friend Hana who lived half a mile away using AOL messenger. We still phoned each other before leaving the house to confirm, because arranging it over chat seemed so unreal.