HI Brian; RE>The situation you described, where AOL rejected your PC club's offer of a nearly free local hookup, is enlightening. Mad at them ever since?...
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Nooo..not about that anyway..at the time I was miffed..but so were
a lot of others..it was a long time ago before the internet..
and it could have just been the particular person, who was
a jerk, and it wasn't so much the turn down, as the tone used,
we were talked down to, like they were the all knowledgeable
and we were just pip squeaks. In fact I laugh about that now.
BTW I dd not say it was nearly FREE..it was as free as any thing
could be. They would not have even had to pay the Sysop, and
the only cost to them would have been their own incoming line,
which had they put in back then would have made them some
money, in fact we offered a gurantee, guess they thought it
was to good to be true..who would volinteer such. But keep in
mind most of the BB sytem in place in the country..was put
there by volinteers and lived off personal donations only,
many a sysop incured a lot of heavy LD charges with out crying
just because of their dedication to the BBS comunity.
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Another reason I'm sure I put grudges behind me is since then, up to
about 3 years ago, I actually put several people on AOL, thinking
AOL might be easter for them to get their feet wet, as they
seemed to be intimidated by a computer, and at best just occasional users if I put them onto the local BB Systems I felt they might get lost so lo and behold..I recommend AOL..explaining to them that I don't use it because it's not a local phone call, but if they felt they could afford to call Houston, it might be a good experience for them. OK, this to has been some time ago..but it turned out that
every one I put on AOL was dissatisfied..and that caused me some embarrassment.
That embarrassment caused by me recommending them, and them not
delivering..caused me some disconcertion, also some of the customers had billing problems..this helped foster in me a negative attitude towards AOL , perhaps more than for some of the other giants.
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Now what all personal motivates I have; is not something you can understand so easily, when one questions, NOT questions but ( just assumes that my motives are so and so ) they assume the roll of GOD, which here again I sense is an attitude that prevails more among AOLers, than in the general public. Maybe it rubs off..like do AOLers
really feel they are the most knowledgable people in the world ?
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My motives are to complex for anyone to just go cluck cluck about,
they encompass my broad outlook as to the essence of right and
wrong, all my values , and in AOLs situation my being prone not to
support something that seems to want all control to come from a central location, because what might work in one place could well be an impediment in other locations. I use windows..but I don't have
a lot nice to say about microsoft. I'm as good as any one I
know of when it comes to setting aside any personal grudges,
were I might fall short in that respect from time to time,
I sure don't focus my life on collecting debts..as you seem to imply.
As a matter of fact in reflecting on it; your saying I'm motivated
by such simple things as that causes me to smile..as I see the
funny side of it.
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You may be surprised to know how many people, are into the internet
and see it as a great "equalizer"..and some of us are
dedicated to see that no one person or Company ever takes control
of it. This dedication is more prevalent among the circle
of "computer friends" I have than the casual user would likely
ever come to understand. I belive AOL has an over commercialized
type attitude, with very little aim at being a service to
the public, but just wants to be some dominating force,
this may in part explain my motives for my taking her
to task..but if I were to get into it deeply, I'm not sure I could
find the words that would satisfy those who think I'm simply
up to it for personal reasons. Large companies that lack or avoid responsibility, and accountability until they are forced to are distasteful to me. There are to many of them for me to be effective if I take them all on, so I pick out just one or two were I think I might alter the course of their blundering path, and do what I can to maybe get them to think, along lines that are not "just for profit" .
You may get me to ease up on AOL,
if you can point out to me were they are involved with
some philanthropy..( outside ) their own realm..how much do
they give say towards "collage scholarships" or do they offer
any free service to any "bonifide not for profit organization"..
a little of that would go long way in overcoming the almost
mercenary image they have themselves projected.
That would be nice..AOL links up and donates free service..
to say the Salvation Army..or if such as that is to much
perhaps more in the local areas they serve..they could pitch
in with some free service on a smaller scale to some of the
local "not for profit" humanitarian shelters..or such.
This in my opinion would do their image more good per dollar
outlay than mailing out free trial disks by the millions, or
spending millions more on top of millions telling the public how
good their system is..it's time for AOL to show us their values !
Then my friends and I may take another look at their system.
Fell free to pass this along to your friend, who is the friend
of Steves Dad..and consider it written in the spirit of really
wanting to be helpfull.
I could add a lot more to it, but enough said for now.
Jim
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