I had what I have since been told by others is a typical experience with America On Line. Our family signed up with the 10 hours free deal, never having been online before. After the first month, the bill was $156! I was planning to drop it at that point anyway, because it was way too expensive and I was now experienced and felt I could navigate the net myself. However, I tried to go online one morning and was locked out--instructed to call an 800 number. At that point a very rude woman told me the account was closed because I was impersonating an AOL employee, trying to get subscribers' passwords! Since this was totally untrue (and I think a felony as well) I was pretty insulted. She told me hacking happens constantly at AOL--they didn't have time to sort out who was really doing it and who wasn't, and it happened way too often to call subscribers or otherwise contact them to discuss it--they just closed the account. I wrote a letter of complaint, and was never charged.
Having said all of that, AOL was nice in that it was fun to talk with the day traders, etc. in the Motley Fool chat rooms. Very intense; I learned a lot. Real time--more intimate and exciting than posting here. They had good investment research free--I think that is probably worth $10 a month. I never used any of the other features--the entertainment area was a total dud in my opinion. My daughter used homework help (tutors online in the evenings to answer questions and teach), and the kids' chat rooms.
What I have read since is that although AOL has a high rate of free trial customers, MANY drop it after they get the first HUGE bill. This is very expensive for AOL. I would agree that they will have to very much lower the price if they hope to compete, as most people are pretty experienced after that first month, and happily go on to slightly less friendly services because of the unlimited service for, typically, less than $20 a month.
However, CompuServe's WOW service does really interest me--because I have a Mac I have to wait until August to try it, however. They have homework tutors, their kids' programs have completely different graphics and options so that kids going online cannot get into adult stuff, and the graphics are appealing for them. They also have kids' chat rooms. This is a lot like AOL, but sounds better. And only $17.95--lifetime guarantee on the rate if you sign up when it first comes out.
I definitely would not under any circumstances invest in AOL, ever (personal opinion). |
