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Dial-up is still the main revenue source for AOL
- jiggy2011 14y agoWow, outside of a very small handful of sites is the web still usable on dial up?
- Shivetya 14y agountil my grandparents passed away their entire use for "the internet" was AOL and that only to receive pictures of their grandchildren. I think I may have some other older relatives who use the net and/or AOL simply for email.
- chc 14y agoIf you have an iPhone, switch to EDGE for something roughly approximating the dialup experience. (I think it's a bit faster, but they're in the same ballpark.)
- plorkyeran 14y agoEDGE tops out at over four times the speed of dialup, amazingly enough.
- chc 14y agoBut AFAIK EDGE almost never gets anywhere close to its theoretical speed limit while 56k modems are usually very close, so in practice EDGE might be something like 50-100% faster.
- enuncajon 14y agoI do not find this surprising at all. I realize it is not dial-up, but my in-laws who pay >$70/month for high-speed broadband are still convinced that AOL is the only route to the "Internet". I cannot convince them otherwise.
- n72 14y agoI wondering how much of this is comprised of auto-renewed subscriptions that people don't even realize they're paying for.
- bunderbunder 14y agoOr people who have broadband, but keep paying for AOL's dialup service because they don't realize they think they need to in order to keep their AOL email and instant messaging accounts. That said, I'd like to have a closer look at the numbers before jumping to any conclusions. Nowadays the situation might be complicated a bit by the fact that AOL bundles "backup dial-up" service in with their packages of paid services that are primarily intended for broadband users.
- jlogsdon 14y agoHeadline, and article, is sensationalist. The article states "that its Membership Group — the division that includes its dial-up Internet business — still generates most of the company's revenue". According to the Yahoo! report[1] it includes every membership service (such as Mail): "The Membership Group, which consists of offerings that serve AOL’s registered account holders, both free and paid, and are focused on delivering world-class experiences to AOL’s loyal users who rely on these AOL products and properties every day. The results for this segment include AOL’s subscription offerings and advertising offerings on Membership Group properties, such as AOL Mail, as well as from performance compensation for marketing third party products and services." [1] http://finance.yahoo.com/news/aol-reports-revenue-growth-first-120000822.html http://finance.yahoo.com/news/aol-reports-revenue-growth-fir...
- yuhong 14y agohttps://www.quora.com/AOL/Did-AOL-make-it-hard-to-cancel-in-order-to-keep-customers https://www.quora.com/AOL/Did-AOL-make-it-hard-to-cancel-in-...
- OGinparadise 14y agoThey had a 10 year or so golden opportunity to pivot and try different models backed by dial-up revenue. I'd say that they failed
- bjoernw 14y agoHow do you define failure?
- OGinparadise 14y agoWhat do they have going for the next 1-5-10 years? A few blogs?
- DavidBradbury 14y agoOddly enough, they're still a company worth roughly $2.17 billion. I'd certainly be happy with that failure.
- OGinparadise 14y agoMe too--even with 170K at this point in my life, but let's look at where AOL was and the chances they had.
- nullvoyd 14y agoThis website messes with my back button. Nobody messes with my back button. Also, terrible design.