Now That's Service
By Mimi Rosenheim
It is time to cast off a long-time friend. I feel guilty, but I know it's the right thing to do.
It is time to dispose of my AOL account.
I know it sounds silly. A woman in my position, with a plethora of email addresses and half a dozen domains registered in my name, feeling guilt and separation anxiety over the loss of her pedestrian AOL email account. And I suppose it is silly, but AOL and I have been together a long time. In fact, I got my first AOL account in 1993. It was a time when I was afraid of hooking a modem to my computer. But AOL and Modems for Dummies got me through it. They opened my eyes to a whole new world—and I became addicted.
But AOL and I no longer have a relationship. It's ceased to be a service provider to me and has become a product and a commodity product at that.
Service or Product?
Let me explain. In the early days, AOL was everything—it made me part of an online community, helped me correspond with friends, and provided me with an infinite source of information on every topic imaginable. When the companies I worked for didn't "get it" enough to provide their employees with email addresses, much less Internet access, I brought in AOL and my own modem just to stay connected.
AOL and I grew together during the online explosion, and I forgave it for its growing pains. Today, I have a handful of better vehicles for Web access. So, AOL has been reduced to a single function—it hosts my personal email account, the one I give to people I meet in other countries with whom I know I'll want to keep in touch.
