Sams Teach Yourself Internet and Web Basics All in One

2017-07-07 02:10:07

You can hardly turn on the television anymore without hearing something about America Online. If it's not a commercial for the service itself, then you'll hear it mentioned at the end of a commercial for something else, such as, "Visit us at www.microsoft.com; AOL keyword 'Microsoft.'"

AOL was once a part of a three-way national online service war with CompuServe and Prodigy. Today, however, AOL is the undisputed king. It seems like a hundred years ago when AOL struck the key blow in that war when it offered unlimited access to its customers for $19.99/month. Before that, all the services were offering "packages" such as 40 hours for this price, with additional charges for additional hours.

When AOL made its bold move, it walked out on a dangerous ledge. At first, customers signed up in droves, only to encounter busy signals when they dialed in because AOL wasn't ready to handle the demand created by the success of their new pricing structure. For a while, it appear AOL's own success would doom it to failure.

But largely, its members stuck with the service. Those who left were likely to return after the connection problems were solved . Today, Virginia-based AOL is the largest Internet service provider in the world. But it's more than an ISP, too.

AOL offers content ”lots of it ”that only its members can see. And, members get full access to the Internet as well, making AOL the largest ISP in the world.

In this chapter, we'll give you an introductory look at AOL 6.0, the latest version of the software, and the services that AOL offers, so you can decide whether AOL is right for you.

In the preceding chapters, you learned about the two primary browsers, Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. In both cases, I walked you through downloading the latest version of the software and then its features.

AOL is different because it's not just a browser. AOL offers its own content, and it requires a subscription (typically in the low $20s per month). As a result, this chapter will be presented backward from the previous two. First, we'll look at the features and advantages of AOL. Then, if you're interested in signing up, you can read about where to get the software and how to sign up.

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