Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Seagoon on August 08, 2006, 12:41:06 PM
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Apologies if you've already seen this one, but here is an article that further builds up AOL's legendary Customer Service Record.
Even dead people can't escape AOL (http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/business/columnists.nsf/techtalk/story/A0F7FD49EFA6565A862571BF006C005A?OpenDocument)
As an aside, many, many moons ago, before the advent of cheap broad-band and DSL, I tried the AOL "free trial." I found out that the word "trial" was actually a reference to the experience of trying to cancel the service before the free portion expired. Getting out of the Columbia House Record and Tape Club was actually easier.
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Thats pretty sad. I'm glad I didnt have those kind of difficulties when I left AOL.
I do still get AOL *free trial* CD's in the mail though. :lol
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Originally posted by Elfie
I do still get AOL *free trial* CD's in the mail though. :lol
The free trial CDs are evil little devices.
Encased in these small CDs are totaly operational, tiny nuclear powerplants.
The powerplant produces power for the ittle bitty radio receivers that are also included and Encased in the CDs along with the superminature sleep detection devices.
At the moment REM is detected , the sleep detector engages a tronsponder that notifies the Top Secret AOL Mind Control bunker.
At this time, nondetectable to the human ear, subliminal broadcast are started.
When recorded and palyed backwards these broadcasts consist of the message....."AOL is the shiznits."
:noid
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AOL Cd's make dandy drink coasters. Another RV'er uses them to make wind chimes and light reflectors to scare away birds from the rig. I use one as a spacer in my satelite tripod setup.
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Remember the good old days when they used floppies? You could just format them and you had a free floppy disk.
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they make great land fill
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Originally posted by Jackal1
The free trial CDs are evil little devices.
Encased in these small CDs are totaly operational, tiny nuclear powerplants.
The powerplant produces power for the ittle bitty radio receivers that are also included and Encased in the CDs along with the superminature sleep detection devices.
At the moment REM is detected , the sleep detector engages a tronsponder that notifies the Top Secret AOL Mind Control bunker.
At this time, nondetectable to the human ear, subliminal broadcast are started.
When recorded and palyed backwards these broadcasts consist of the message....."AOL is the shiznits."
:noid
That's pretty funny. :lol
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Originally posted by Seagoon
Apologies if you've already seen this one, but here is an article that further builds up AOL's legendary Customer Service Record.
In addition, AOL just released the searches of over 650K+ members from over a three month period. It contains a level of odd that makes me cry for humanity. It also contains VISA numbers, social security numbers, full names, addresses and phone numbers.
WTG AOL.
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Originally posted by Maverick
AOL Cd's make dandy drink coasters. Another RV'er uses them to make wind chimes and light reflectors to scare away birds from the rig. I use one as a spacer in my satelite tripod setup.
LMAO thats exactly wat i do with every AOL Disk, COASTER! lol you will never run out and if u do well call aol and ask for a disk or two lol.
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They make crappy coasters, it's the hole in the middle that makes it so.
A better use is to cover the hole with a post-it-note on the backside then set them up on a shooting range, put a .45 through the hole w/o touching the cd at 25ft and claim bragging rights to being a good shot, but it's more fun to be off a bit. :D
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Might wanna save some now.
they may become collectors items.
with AOHELL going the free route.
They will no longer be giving out those disks
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Oh and the funny part is.
Yes AOL is going ot be free for anone with their own ISP.
But if you WANT their customer support.
Your gonna haveta pay :rofl
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This kind of nonsense is more common than you might think. I had a similar problem with AT&T @Home broadband a few years ago.
When I moved I closed my account and returned the modem and got a receipt. They continued to bill my account for months even though we made numerous calls, faxed the modem receipt and sent certified letters. They would admit that the account was closed and then they would say that we would no longer be billed, yet every month they took more money out of my account. I finally closed my entire account with that bank because of it.
I always wondered if someone there was embezzling money from other ex customers like me. Talked to a lawyer about it but it would have cost more money to pursue it than I lost.
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In the interest of providing a spectrum of opinion, I've been an AOLer from its beginning and have always enjoyed it as the most user friendly portal on the internet.
AOL certainly has had its ups and downs, but it also still has around 15 million subscribers. Evolving to FREE is a bold move that would have been even more impressive a couple years ago, but better late than never.
AOL declined mostly because while it dominated telephone access providers, it never repeated that dominance in cable access. Yet AOL was still appealing enough with its bring your own provider option that I stayed with it after I got Comcast.
Take another look at AOL. Won't cost you a cent.
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Originally posted by Halo
In the interest of providing a spectrum of opinion, I've been an AOLer from its beginning and have always enjoyed it as the most user friendly portal on the internet.
AOL certainly has had its ups and downs, but it also still has around 15 million subscribers. Evolving to FREE is a bold move that would have been even more impressive a couple years ago, but better late than never.
AOL declined mostly because while it dominated telephone access providers, it never repeated that dominance in cable access. Yet AOL was still appealing enough with its bring your own provider option that I stayed with it after I got Comcast.
Take another look at AOL. Won't cost you a cent.
Yeah, if you don't mind that AOL releases your private search queries to be shared with the entire internet, then AOL is just for you! :aok
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What is the value that AOL provides? How is it better than just any local ISP?
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Originally posted by Halo
In the interest of providing a spectrum of opinion, I've been an AOLer from its beginning and have always enjoyed it as the most user friendly portal on the internet.
AOL certainly has had its ups and downs, but it also still has around 15 million subscribers. Evolving to FREE is a bold move that would have been even more impressive a couple years ago, but better late than never.
AOL declined mostly because while it dominated telephone access providers, it never repeated that dominance in cable access. Yet AOL was still appealing enough with its bring your own provider option that I stayed with it after I got Comcast.
Take another look at AOL. Won't cost you a cent.
:rofl
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Go ahead, guffaw, O ye of little faith. You can bet AOL has been doing lots of things right for a long time or it wouldn't still be the largest on-line community.
And now it's free.
Go take a look.
Won't hurt.
Honest.
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you should have a little competition...
who can build the highest AOL free trial CD tower.
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Please do not try them. It will hurt. Thier software is the nastiest thing that ever happened to a computer. They replace the Windows TCP stack with thier own. They plant all manner of background carp processes. Thier software can mangle a computer faster than cheezwiz can cause constipation.
The only reason AOL has been successful is due to the ignorance of computer users and a very large advertising/marketing budget.
Technically, they have accomplished a feat. Thier network is the largest in the world. Not something so trivial to accomplish. Aside from that, they are a plague upon mankind driven to control your computer more than you or Bill Gates wants to do.
I have enough support problems with th emess Comcast has created here of late. I really do not need a bunch of our players heading over to AOL. It would be too much for me to bear.
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I'm using Comcast Skuzzy.......what problems has Comcast created?
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^ yes, especially curious as Time-Warner has consumed Comcast in the Plano-Frisco area also.
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Comcast's network has been experiencing high levels of packet loss, bad to poor routing and a melee of other anomalies. The Time Warner buyout of certain areas of thier network is causing more route fluctuations as Time Warner transitions old Comcast users to thier network.
Comcast aint looking so good these days. Not much of a surprise to me. It's only a matter of time before all the cable ISP's fold up, unless they raise thier prices or decrease available bandwidth to users.
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Originally posted by Skuzzy
Comcast aint looking so good these days. Not much of a surprise to me. It's only a matter of time before all the cable ISP's fold up, unless they raise thier prices or decrease available bandwidth to users.
is it becomming un-profitable for them?
what is our alternative?
for me, I'm about to re-sign up for cable internet, and it was always excelent for me... neighbor had DSL a while back and nowhere near the speed I had. (he didn't online game so i don't know about packet loss for him but it was was really more than 3 times slower than my cable)
some of you guys talk about fiber optic, and other stuff going into your houses, I guess Milwaukee is in the stone ages, because not a single mention of anything like that in the area here. heck 2 miles from me (affluent suburab of Milwaukee) you still can't get cable OR DSL internet, satellite or dial up- thats it.
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Skuzzy has a hard on for the cable co, something about a cable line sticking up in his backyard for ages... :)
high speed road runner is the best highspeed connection for the dollar bar none
if it is available in your area - get it
the last thing you want is a telephone company running your internet, phone and television - that is where it is headed if we let it
aol has it's place too. for old folks and newbies to the internet, it is a great place to start. my guess is that over half the ppl on this board started there many moons ago ..
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Hehe Eagler, you are referring to the TV side. The only issue I have with cable Internet is the cost cannot possibly cover the bandwidth they claim to make available to customers.
It never has made economical sense and more than one cable ISP has gone belly up trying to make it work at that cost scale. And with more and more higher data demand options/features being available over the Internet the cost to user data demand ratios get worse. Where the user is moving more data than the business plan allowed for.
It is always a matter of time for these things. Cable companies pay for thier bandwidth and the cost of that bandwidth is based on average use. As the average use increases, so does thier cost.
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Originally posted by Halo
Go ahead, guffaw, O ye of little faith. You can bet AOL has been doing lots of things right for a long time or it wouldn't still be the largest on-line community.
And now it's free.
Go take a look.
Won't hurt.
Honest.
I didn't want to be insulting and I don't think Skuzzy did either but here is the answer is to your question. You should run, not walk, from the hideous trainwreck that is AOL.
Orignally posted by SkuzzyTheir software is the nastiest thing that ever happened to a computer. They replace the Windows TCP stack with thier own. They plant all manner of background carp processes. Thier software can mangle a computer faster than cheezwiz can cause constipation.
The only reason AOL has been successful is due to the ignorance of computer users and a very large advertising/marketing budget.
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Originally posted by Skuzzy
Comcast's network has been experiencing high levels of packet loss, bad to poor routing and a melee of other anomalies. The Time Warner buyout of certain areas of thier network is causing more route fluctuations as Time Warner transitions old Comcast users to thier network.
Comcast aint looking so good these days. Not much of a surprise to me. It's only a matter of time before all the cable ISP's fold up, unless they raise thier prices or decrease available bandwidth to users.
Hmm, that could explain why sometimes when I click on links or bookmarks the page doesnt open and I get an error message, but when I click on it again the page magically opens.
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That is it right there Elfie. It appears Comcast is trying to sell off thier high usage areas to other ISP's. Getting rid of the DF/W area should help them a little, but the burden on Time Warner users is going to be felt.
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So what can Comcast do to fix this? Other than selling off parts of their customer base.
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Spend more money upgrade thier network. Buy more bandwidth, higher end routers. Lots of stuff, but lots of money involved as well.
It is also somewhat seasonal. Right now is probably one of the peak Internet usage periods. It will probably settle down in another two to three weeks, then hit again around the end of November.
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Originally posted by Skuzzy
Spend more money upgrade thier network. Buy more bandwidth, higher end routers. Lots of stuff, but lots of money involved as well.
It is also somewhat seasonal. Right now is probably one of the peak Internet usage periods. It will probably settle down in another two to three weeks, then hit again around the end of November.
During the last few months cable lines in our area were upgraded to provide more bandwidth. (I think thats why). If Comcast does all that, I suspect I'll end up paying more for my cable connection.
One of the reasons we left Earthlink DSL was that Comcast was not only faster, but cheaper. Another reason was I couldnt understand the heavy Indian accent of the Earthlink tech support. I was dealing with Earthlink's tech support because our DSL modem kept losing sync, then it would take up to 45 minutes to re-sync again.
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Hmmm, three of my four favorite internet things converge here, and two of them are being sharply maligned: AOL and Comcast.
The third? Aces High. (Cue chorus: Let's hear the dark side of that!)
The fourth fav thingie: Google.
From years of history on these internet enterprises, there is a wide variety of experience with each, and a corresponding difference of opinion. In Northern Virginia, many people badmouth Cox Cable -- it's not in my area, so I don't know about it, but several friends have been consistent in not recommending it.
Like any product, we hear the most about things we don't like since survival hinges on avoiding bad stuff.
So from my experience of more than a decade with each, I'll call your hand and stand pat with four aces, one High.
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Please understand, I am not pro DSL, pro cable anti-any-Internet-connection. I just do not see the long term viability of cable Internet access at current prices/bandwidth. DSL is more in line.
Verizon's FIOS Internet service is another one I do not see long term viability for. They appear to be depending on the home person buying everything over FIOS (Internet, YV, phone) in order to be profitable. Of course the phone company has an edge. They do not have to actually pay for the mechanical connection to the Internet. Oh, they do it on paper, but it is just funny money.
EDIT: I ake part of that back. I an anti-AOL, simply due to thier software and the way it infests a computer to the point of a user giving up 15% of thier CPU performance for the pleasure of running AOL software all the time.
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Originally posted by Skuzzy
faster than cheezwiz can cause constipation.
Thanks Skuzz. I have been wondering what the problem was. :)
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i had AOL once upon a time... it took me 5 months to cancel them... and im alive.. i started using Medicom and i was still getting billed for AOL. I told them time and time again to cancel my account. Gladly i didnt get rude folks on the other side of the phone, just dumb ones. WW2 online was like that too.... i cancelled my account long time ago and then when i was checking out my bank account i was still being charged (2 months after cancellation)... i couldnt remember my user and password (key to being able to cancel).. fought with those clowns for awhile. Bad thing is if you bill something to a debit card, youll have to close the account inorder to stop the billing... silly....
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Originally posted by 101ABN
Bad thing is if you bill something to a debit card, youll have to close the account inorder to stop the billing... silly....
that is the nice thing about my mastercard card. I can open up virtual accounts under the main account giving them limits/lives of their own so in case that number gets loose, I can kill it without having to kill the main account
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Funnily enough I have the opposite problem. I can't get my internet provider, ironically called SMART telecom to take any money. All I get is a bill telling me that an overdue amount is owed. But part of the terms of signing up was that they you must supply bank details for a direct debit.
So I've been phoning and emailing them begging them to take the money:rolleyes: Finally this morning I got a text message saying the account doesn't accept direct debits. I sure hope it does as my house mortgage goes through that account.
Oh well, let's try again.
I had no trouble cancelling my previous internet provider. On top of that they somehow forgot to bill me for the full amount I owed.
You see, sometimes incompetance works in your favour.:rofl
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Originally posted by Skuzzy
EDIT: I ake part of that back. I an anti-AOL, simply due to thier software and the way it infests a computer to the point of a user giving up 15% of thier CPU performance for the pleasure of running AOL software all the time.
I've never had any luck removing AOL from friend's computers unless I formatted the damn thing. Without a doubt, AOL's software are sometimes more detrimental than a virus...