I worked at AOL in 1995. We had three million users at that point, and we had recently upgraded to a live Internet e-mail gateway system. I was the first Intern

I worked at AOL in 1995. We had three million users at that point, and we had recently upgraded to a live Internet e-mail gateway system. I was the first Internet mail operations person ever hired by AOL. My job on my first day was to install the fourth inbound mail gateway system. By 1996, we were up to five million users, and Steve Case gave everyone in the company a special company jacket as a bonus. I still have mine, although it hasn't fit me in a couple of decades. Even as late as 1997 (when I left), most AOL users were still in the "walled garden". Sure, we were the biggest Internet e-mail provider in the world, but that was still just a small fraction of the total AOL users. AIM was much more popular than e-mail. Advances were being made in efficiently distributing AIM chat messages efficiently that would not be exceeded in the outside world until the advent of BitTorrent. However, by 1997, I think we did have more users coming into AOL over the Internet and their local ISP, as opposed to through our own modem banks. That was in part due to the "unlimited" plans that AOL rolled out, but the telephone calls themselves would have to be paid for if the user dialed non-local POPs for our modem banks, and many of our modem banks were totally overloaded. AOL's big "hockey stick" moment was in 1995, sure. But the "hockey stick" moment for the Internet was at least a year or two later.