AOL’s dial up internet takes its last bow, marking the end of an era
https://apnews.com/article/aol-dial-up-internet-shuts-down-08162912737f2fb221f10ba87ce5fc41
https://apnews.com/article/aol-dial-up-internet-shuts-down-08162912737f2fb221f10ba87ce5fc41
45 Comments
DirkMcCallahan@lemmy.world · 74 pts · 332d
File this under "things that I assumed happened decades ago."
JackbyDev@programming.dev · 7 pts · 331d
SDF.org has dial-up. And a Lemmy instance. I think it's lemmy.sdf.org
TwinTitans@lemmy.world · 31 pts · 332d
I’d rather go back to using the internet that dial up was used for than this high speed cesspool we have now.
kibiz0r@midwest.social · 24 pts · 332d
Idk.
It was hard to find things even with a search engine, and it was full of scams and spyware, and obnoxious designs that got in the way of the real content, and the most popular chat rooms were run by power-tripping nerds with too much free time and an endless interest in CSAM and Nazi ideology.
Not like today, where… uh… well…
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 8 pts · 332d
I never had too much trouble finding my way around, and it was the real wild West. You could find all kinds of cool shit. Could just visit Jon Does website with a list of game roms and download them with no bs.
Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 331d
I’ll never forget the feeling of finding a really good webring and surfing all night.
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 4 pts · 331d
Web rings were awesome
Inaminate_Carbon_Rod@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 331d
Watch out for the Goatse though
Preventer79@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 331d
whereyaaat@lemmings.world · 10 pts · 331d
The old internet is still out there, you just have to find it.
Psythik@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 331d
Nah, I don't miss forums and chat rooms enough to go back to those days again. I need my comments to be sorted by uovote count to preserve my sanity. I can't go back. People are assholes.
architect@thelemmy.club · 1 pts · 324d
These ways to communicate on the Internet feel like stagnation at this point.
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 0 pts · 332d
♥️
blimthepixie@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 24 pts · 332d
It's 2025 and dial up still exists
Mind = dial up sounds
robocall@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 332d
Are these households in rural areas without many alternatives?
Starlink is available in the vast majority of the US. What is the cost difference though?
edit: i dont like elon musk or starlink
uberdroog@lemmy.world · 24 pts · 332d
F starlink
robocall@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 332d
True
Zephorah@discuss.online · 9 pts · 332d
Mashable did an article on it, saying it wasn’t easy to find but $9.99/mo appeared to be the cost, still, after all this time. But it would only run on windows PCs.
brbposting@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 331d
No way. Kind of awesome of them maybe unless ulterior motives
whereyaaat@lemmings.world · 5 pts · 331d
Starlink actually sucks fat dick unless it's literally your only option.
Even in rural America, you still have access to Visible's unlimited data for $25/month. They use Verizon's network, which covers just about everywhere people live in the US.
___@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 1 pts · 331d
I didn't realize Visible has unlimited hotspotting. ATT/TMO block/paywall that, though it's possible to bypass using custom ROMs or non carrier firmware in some cases
Reverendender@sh.itjust.works · 4 pts · 332d
Starlink is $120 a month
cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de · 1 pts · 332d
You can get the roam plan for $50 a month. If you were doing fine with dial-up, then the 50GB data cap shouldn't be an issue. You could even use the standby mode for $5 a month for 11 months out of the year and will still be an order of magnitude faster than the dial-up connection.
AmbiguousProps@lemmy.today · 0 pts · 331d
I would rather use dialup.
ohshittheyknow@lemmynsfw.com · 4 pts · 331d
Im not giving a penny to that Nazi owned company
heavyboots@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 332d
Probably about 1 year's worth of dial-up per month of Starlink, if not more…
some_kind_of_guy@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 332d
There are other legacy satellite providers like hughesnet that are somehow still hanging on. They don't really hold a candle to starlink performance-wise, and they shit the bed in bad weather, but at least they're not Elon. There's going to be a lot of latency, but it'll feel blazing fast if you're coming from dialup.
There are other dialup providers still remaining as well, besides AOL. I know msn is still kicking at least. It's kind of funny to think about receiving dialup service when almost all POTS lines have gone away, and much of the modern web will be borderline unusable without lots of tweaking, but at least grandma who lives out in the sticks can check her email, use chat clients, download articles and books, etc.
Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 331d
New retirement gig: Fill the gap in the market for super-rural dialup.
It’d be like the new version of a rural post office. I could actually be a lineman for the county!
frongt@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 331d
There's no market. Fixed wireless is the current thing.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 332d
Its not perfect to replace for all those rural households, but a 5G based internet 'gateway' is an affordable and viable option for people at least somewhere near a 5G tower.
Unlike that national fiber build out that never really happened to anywhere near the extent that was promised, its not that expensive to set up a 5G cell tower, and for users its eaaay cheaper than any satellite internet, including Starlink.
JackbyDev@programming.dev · 3 pts · 331d
Okay but about the fiber shit, they covered 99.7% of my city and didn't cover my street and I'm within walking distance of city hall. I really wish there was a way I could compel them to give me fiber. One of the few things I dislike about my location.
shalafi@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 332d
Weirdly, I'm seeing fiber in the most unlikely places. They're running it in my hood, which is on the bleeding edge of a small redneck town, nowhere downstream from here to feed for more money.
What really blew my mind, they're running fiber in the hood where my camp lies, 900 souls altogether, and that includes a fair-sized surrounding area. Can't be 50 homes anywhere near. And again, nothing downstream of that hood, it's just for us. And both places already had cable internet.
No idea how those two ISPs will ever earn their money back from so few customers, with maintenance stacked on top. Maybe running fiber is stupid cheap now? Haven't worked for an ISP for 20 years, who knows.
frongt@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 331d
Plastic fiber is probably a lot cheaper than copper wire, for one thing. Probably easier to multiplex too.
shalafi@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 331d
Had not thought of that! Been 20-years since I've been at an ISP, times change.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 332d
Wait, what?
I am genuienly surprised to hear this... I mean... cool... I guess?
That... there's more fiber lines than I thought there... was?
But also yeah that doesn't make any business sense to me either.
Unless they're planning on building a data center there in the near future.
Then, that might make a lot of sense.
Oh well, I'm still pissed that we gave ISPs like half a trillion dollars or whatever to build out fiber around a decade ago, and because that law was written by lobbyists, well it was apparently legal for said ISPs to just throw most of that money at stock buybacks and C suite stock packages, and then there were never any consequences for that.
Either way, I'll take not blazing fast speeds and no datacap over... literally any plan with a data cap, anyday.
shalafi@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 331d
Less than a billion I think, but several hundred million? Anyway, you're right, they ate it all paying off investors in the form of stock buybacks. Rural folk got nada.
Yeah, very weird expansion. We don't even have much in the way of utilities at camp. We can get water, but certainly no sewer. Hell, you can't even build "permanent structures" on my land. And I assume the surrounding land is even worse for flooding and being protected wetlands.
Sounds like I can get a power pole for free! Still working on that.
The roads are private, anyone can travel them, no problem, but they're on us to maintain. Couple of dudes use tractors to level them and someone dropped loads of gravel and red clay to fix the slippery bits. (Shit like this is why country people think they don't need no goddamned gubermint. You'd have to live it to understand.)
This is a Cox Cable endeavour. Used to contract for them, finest ISP I ever heard of. Apparently the Cox family took it public, then bought it back, said fuck you to the stock market and ran it themselves again. Hard to describe to those not in the business, but their cable plant is head and shoulders above anything I've ever touched. I assume they're rich as hell and I wish them well, well deserved for once.
BigBrownBeaver@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 331d
So... AOL now EOL
whereyaaat@lemmings.world · 8 pts · 331d
Really? I use my phone for internet full-time now.
It looks like we've come full circle.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 6 pts · 331d
Lol that era ended decades ago
letsgo2themall@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 331d
I'll never forgive them for what they did to usenet! Also, I assumed this happened like 20 years ago. Color me surprised.
shalafi@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 332d
Anyone still using dial up as a back-channel solution? Never implemented that myself, but seemed a cheap and easy way to get into your remote network in case of fuck up or outage. Banks used to do it. Anyone know?
frongt@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 331d
I'm sure it's doable. But a cellular pay-as-you-go data plan and router is pretty common.
I don't think telcos will even give you copper phone service any more, unless you happen to be in a covered area, or you want to pay an exorbitant amount. Most service is going to be VoIP or cellular with a desk phone.
randomcruft@lemmy.sdf.org · 2 pts · 332d
BagOfHeavyStones@piefed.social · 2 pts · 332d
Now to hook two modems to two computers and get them to 'talk' over WhatsApp...
Would that be a VPN tunnel of sorts?
cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 332d
That's just a direct connection. It used to be common for 2 player games to connect that way.
vladmech@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 331d
So much Warcraft 2 with my cousin over direct connect. Those were good times
rabber@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 332d
And here i've been whining daily about my 50mbps dsl