This article in the Times highlights the extent to which AOL's constant efforts to "reinvent" itself will continue to be fruitless. Like millions of others, AOL was my first Internet experience. It was a phenomenal service on many levels, and the instant messenger alone allowed me to "speak" with family and friends more in one week than I had the previous decade. I was a Community Leader. I met my wife through AOL. I had two accounts. Any shortcomings with spam and poor interfaces with other services due to proprietary programming was a small price to pay for the virtual 24 hour "Cheers" tavern we enjoyed. This was all due to Steve Case, who envisioned more than just an Internet portal, but thousands of specialized online communities where a guy in New York could BS about the Yankees with someone in LA, or even Asia.
Around 2001, as Case became more of a hands off executive, the erosion began. Online communities, where one could go to read and post messages on anything from baseball to dogs to gardening, went from well moderated destinations to cesspools of trolls and spam. Terms of Service was watered down to the point where trolls members who would have previously been banned from the boards became regulars. Community Leadership's hands were tied. The experience we thought nothing of paying twenty bucks a month for no longer seemed like such a bargain. Then they raised the price. What a formula! More money for less in return.
When those online communities became less of a value (or none at all), previously loyal members were left with icons, spam filled inboxes, and an application that slowed their computers down. AOL decided that more bells and whistles were the answer (instead of the obvious, which was to keep the things that kept members loyal at a high quality), although spam controls never seemed to be a priority until it was far too late. I wasn't an AOL member for bells and whistles, especially when my two biggest issues, security and spam, were not addressed. So since 2002, members have been leaving in droves.
All the while, AOL has kept shrinking - to 21.2 million subscribers in January from 26.5 million in 2002 - as the dial-up customers it brought online shift increasingly to high-speed access from their phone and cable companies.
It isn't just dial up, however. I still have two AOL accounts, but I never use them. I had some hope that things might improve, but only a week or so ago I received an email informing me that the Community Leader program was to be discontinued. The thousands of volunteers who moderated the online communities, exchanging hours of time for a waived monthly fee, are to be no more. It makes sense; our hands have been tied for years anyway. It marks the official end of an era that began dying 4 years ago. In my view, it is no coincidence that AOL's stock has been a literal match of the quality of member's experience. What was "Cheers" is now an overcrowded subway restroom. AOL doesn't need more features. It needs Steve Case.
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