AOL ends dial-up internet service after more than 30 years
"AOL routinely evaluates its products and services and has decided to discontinue Dial-up Internet, " the company said in a notice to subscribers in the US and Canada on Friday. The service will no longer be available in AOL plans as of 30 September, the firm added."Thanks for the memories RIP," wrote AOL co-founder Steve Case, who presided over the firm's growth in the 1990s.The company was known for luring customers by mailing them free trial discs and at one point claimed ownership of nearly 40% of the time that Americans spent online.AOL, which merged with Time Warner in 2000 in a deal widely deemed disastrous, boasted more than 30 million subscribers at the end of 2001.But its lead had already started to be eroded, as broadband offerings from rivals started to gain traction. As early as 2003, obituaries for dial-up service had begun, as in a Wall Street Journal article that declared: "It's official. Dial-up is dying."In the UK, AOL was toppled from the top spot as internet service provider in 1999.Time Warner spun off AOL in 2009. It was acquired by Verizon in 2015, which saw value in its mobile technology business and later merged it with Yahoo. Today, AOL and Yahoo are owned by Apollo Global.
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