Anyway the answer to kc's question is (1) you can TCP into aol from
anywhere you have a internet connection. (Just select .. TCP connection.)
or (2) SprintNet (and hence I suppose AOL, compuserve, EasySabre if you're
a travel agent, etc etc) is available around the world, not just in the US
... call SprintNet and get the local number for their x.25 system wherever
you may be.
Whilst I agree with you that AOL sucks and is probably a dying breed, Greg,
it is not sensible to dismiss it's many features, technical and content.
For instance just for stupid stuff like downloading Apple's latest version
of open transport (8 megs or whatever), 'keyword apple' on AOL, at 288,
runs about 5 -to- 20 times faster than FTP from Apple's site over the
internet, at 288
The fact is (IMHO Greg) if you have aol and Fetch icons on your desktop you
will preferentially use aol everytime for getting something like the latest
patch for Dark Forces from lucas arts.
Also obviously AOL owns 288 modems in every US city, so if you're on the
move with a laptop you can have your mail forwarded their from your 'real'
email account and use a local number.
As for content, ooodles of magazines from Time (Newt = Man of the Year !?)
to Sci. American to Business Week, NY Times, and even america's best
newspaper (PLUG), I.B.D., are all available on AOL, usually with most
photots, including back issues. Technically the downlaoding of the
articles, photos etc actually works. FWIW as a practical matter I find I
often use AOL for this feature. (We have an account on everything at the
office here to check em out, including all the ISPs in the area.)
However I am very interested in guessing how the whole 'online wars' will
turn out.
MSM, now ms-n-bc, Prodidgy, local ISPs versus mega-ISPs, AOLs vs. ISPs ...
it's a big question mark area.
Can anyone see into the future ?
>>
>> Just spent what seemed like hours trying to get my email dot
>address
>> and aols' mail host address from on line 'live'(sic)
>tech.support.They
>> finally
>> told me that it was priorety information!What's so secret.You
>guys can't use
>> Winchat.exe or Eudora?Or can you?I can collect my email from
>U.K. using
>> Eudora,but that's about it.You can't even access Trumpet
>Winsock...
>> I know some people here are on aol.How do you manage?
>>
>> If you can access dot addresses here please help me
>> Thanx,
>> kc
>>
>
>Oh, fer chrissakes, just give up ENTIRELY on AOL. There is no
>good reason at all to subscribe to AOL. There's very little on
>AOL that you can't find somewhere on the Internet plus about a
>bazillion other things you can grab off the Internet for next to
>nothing that's going to cost you something ridiculous like
>$4/hour on AOL.
>
>Find a decent Internet Service Provider in your locality (I read
>an article today in the Richmond Times-Disgrace er...Times-
>Dispatch, that is, that even rural areas of this state have ISP-
>hookups these days). You can find a decent ISP that's going to
>give you at least a full Unix-style menu account for around
>US$20-25 a month, and you can probably get a SLIP account for
>under $35/month (and you probably won't even have to pay that
>much). Then you can use Eudora, et al to your heart's content.
>
>AOL sucks. As does Prodigy, Compuserve, GEnie, et al. These
>"online services" are money pits for people who don't know much
>about computers to throw their hard-earned dollars into. The
>information-available to dollars-charged ration sucks in
>comparison to the Internet proper.
>
>About the only legitimate reason to use AOL/Prodigy/Compuserve is
>to access certain commercial databases (like LEXIS/NEXIS, etc.)
>which (a) you could haul your but down to your local university
>library and access for free probably or (b) will likely be
>commercially available via the Internet itself within the next
>two years or so.
>
>Forget AOL. It's a dying breed, IMO.
>
>
>--
>Greg Ritter
>gritter@vcu.edu
>ritter@urvax.urich.edu
>http://www.urich.edu/~ritter
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OT 1.0.8 + FreePPP 1.0.2 = happiness (relatively speaking)