Paul, nothing is unique about AOL's content. Any website can come up with similar content. Now people may continue to want this content, but if that's ALL they do with AOL, that changes the nature of what AOL does for a living.
The same age old argument. Anyone can do it if they really wanted to. So, then why the hell don't they? I believe a few have tried (MSN, Prodigy, etc), but it seems they didn't want it enough.
In Canada, Bell's Internet service has been increasing its membership while many other ISP's have gone out of business. They too offer technical assistance for 'newbies'. The cable companies, too, might excel at this. Aside from the occasional outage, did you ever need to be an expert to get your cable working correctly?
Cable for your home and cable access for your computer are two different things. Various thing have to be configured for a cable modem to work on a pc. As mentioned previously on this thread, if cable modems become the big thing...you think enough cable techs will be ready to service your computer if there is a glitch? Hard enough to get the "cable guy" to come out on time as it is.
I remember the days of DOS, when the local computer genius would set up a handy "shell" on the computer so others could use a nice menu to start their programs without having to learn DOS commands. Thankfully, Apple and then Windows came along. We no longer need that annoying DOS shell to help us through our day. There will come a day when folks won't need those AOL training wheels anymore...not because they've become more technically proficient, but because someone else will give them the 'real deal' for the same price, or less.
Who? If the trend is for faster access as you say, when will it be able to match the current price for unlimited access. Last I checked a cable connections costs around $40/month, plus set-up and card. ISDN costs even more. BTW, for some people the "AOL training wheels" is all they want, need, or care to have. They aren't looking for the latest and greatest.
The paradigm shift will come, any experienced user can feel the need for it already. Dialup access compared to the future faster connections is like loading in your software via cassette tape vs. a hard drive (remember those days?) The web is getting clogged up, the online experience is getting more frustrating as we get used to higher bandwidth applications. Pages load slowly. We get teased by news reports, and voice e-mail, and movies, and other hints of what the web 'could be' for us. But we can't have it at 56Kbs.
It won't all happen overnight, but when the change comes, it will kill AOL's reason for existing as a DIALUP service.
The shift will come because technology never stops to rest. But you are discounting the fact that AOL keeps up with all access mediums. Dial up is not the only way to connect to AOL. Every access route commercially available in widespread use can be used to access AOL.
As all the content moved off of the various proprietary doo-dads, and searching the web and sending e-mail began to follow universal standards instead of the old weird way, everyone had one thing in common. They needed an e-mail address and web access. Lucky for AOL, they provided the web access. They did a good job of providing what everyone needed to perform tasks on a global system that was becoming a universal standard.
However, what if that universal standard gets old? What if the ol' phone connections don't cut it anymore? What if people one day wake up and say...I used to like the AOL content, but all the other websites offer this free. They'll say: I used to be thick-headed enough to think that AOL was the best way of dialing up the internet, but I now realize that it is one of the worst ways. In fact, AOL is really obsolete, and overpriced.
Why can't anyone do that now? Everyone has a choice. No one is forced to sign on with AOL. Yet millions continue to do so. Blame it on the marketing, the disks, whatever. Bottom line - it works. Obviously the bears on this thread have already made their choice. But hundreds of millions of other consumers have not.
Successful survival of advertising-supported Web services eventually depend on integrating the Web with TV's. Better quicker graphics, more comfortable 'broadcast quality' experience...from the comfort of the ol' sofa. That of course means new boxes, better surfin', and higher bandwidth.
LOL. Yeah, the day I decide to get some work done on my pc, I wanna plop down on the sofa, have the kids running up and down asking me to switch web sites, or watch Barney. I wanna watch the game...not wait, wife wants to surf over to Martha Stewart. If WebTV was going to be the future, there would have been a lot more early adopters. A few hundred thousand isn't gonna cut it. When they start adding some zeros to the end of there numbers, then maybe some people will take notice. Just do a quick survey - ask people if they know who AOL is. Then ask if they know what WebTV is, what it does, how to get, etc. etc.
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