Alternative to AOL?

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Alternative to AOL?
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mochyn

Joined: 21 Dec 2004
Posts: 24585
Location: mid-Wales

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:53 pm Post subject: Alternative to AOL?
I'm fed up with AOL. Can anyone recommend a good alternative? Bearing in mind that I'm a techno-idiot, of course

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:54 pm Post subject:
BT? AOL is a complete waste of space, anybody else will be better and there's enough people here to get you up to speed with an alternative if you have probs

twoscoops

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 1924
Location: Warwickshire

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:55 pm Post subject:
What's wrong with AOL?

mrutty

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 1578

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:56 pm Post subject:
https://www.adslguide.org.uk/ gives you a netural benchmark. I'd always go Pipex or BT if you have a business account. Great service and Pipex and BT have worked together for years. Normally find line faults raised by Pipex are addressed in a few hours not the 3 day SLA they have with all service providers.

mochyn

Joined: 21 Dec 2004
Posts: 24585
Location: mid-Wales

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:59 pm Post subject:
It seems expensive (but then I have nothing to compare it to); don't think I like the whole AOL/TimeWarner thing; there are often problems with needing to do things differently on AOL; tons of advertising: need I go on?! I'll have a look at BT, Tahir, Ta.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 1:59 pm Post subject:

Twoscoops wrote:

What's wrong with AOL?

They have their own browser thingy which is picky and choosy about what it's going to work with and how, you can get round this by using a browser as well as AOL but that sort of defeats the object.

mrutty

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 1578

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:00 pm Post subject:

Twoscoops wrote:

What's wrong with AOL?

It's over priced shitte that is packaged to have minimal impact on their infrastructure. Designed to hide all useful components from the user and hide the true nature of the 'Net'. Not interested in the great interests of the 'Net' and fails to follow RFCs until forced by overwheming pressure from it's users.

Pauses for breath.....

but otherwise fine

my mother uses AOL and it takes most of my life fixing their upgrades

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:02 pm Post subject:

mrutty wrote:

That's one way of putting it.

twoscoops

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 1924
Location: Warwickshire

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:09 pm Post subject:
Righto.

jema
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28238
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:13 pm Post subject:

mrutty wrote:

Twoscoops wrote:

What's wrong with AOL?

my mother uses AOL and it takes most of my life fixing their upgrades

My FIL went AOL originally, I recall popping round to help him, and finding myself at a loss, because in the AOL package all the standard bits from the internet were renamed or otherise f*&*ed with, as AOL decided it had the right to impose its own totally non standard infrastructure.

I know this is unfair on people who have no reason to know any better when they choose AOL but AOL has always been known as "assholes on line" by techies.

jema

dougal

Joined: 15 Jan 2005
Posts: 7184
Location: South Kent

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:13 pm Post subject:
For anyone used to 'proper' net access AOL is a pain. Quite a lot of things are done differently, or simply seem not to work. BUT - I had understood that AOL was quite highly regarded for their family-friendly nannying censorship, and accordingly might be a good recommendation for kids... I'm not an advocate of relying on on-line support for internet access problems (think about it!)

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:16 pm Post subject:
And then there's the issue of the billions of AOL Cd's filling up landfill worldwide

mrutty

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 1578

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 2:20 pm Post subject:

dougal wrote:

For anyone used to 'proper' net access AOL is a pain. Quite a lot of things are done differently, or simply seem not to work.

BUT - I had understood that AOL was quite highly regarded for their family-friendly nannying censorship, and accordingly might be a good recommendation for kids...

I'm not an advocate of relying on on-line support for internet access problems (think about it!)

Yes they do help to stop kiddie surfing, but download Opera or the like and you can I'm told bypass it. It really only uses the MS plugin service. If you want real kiddies safe NetNanny or SurfControl are the very best and issue updates daily.

judyofthewoods

Joined: 29 Jan 2005
Posts: 804
Location: Pembrokeshire

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 3:18 pm Post subject:

I took a free trial with AOL when I first went onto the net 4 years ago, and did not like it, and when trying to cancel, I had a real difficult time getting through to them on the phone (the only way I could cancel), spending hours listening to menus and musac grrr, and then some real hard sales pap, allmost threats of suicide from the op if I didn't renew.....I'd run a mile from AOL, quite apart from all the other issues mentioned above.
I have tiscali, which is quite reasonable in price and quite reliable. I use a blank browser (MS IE), and pick my search engine from the favorites when needed, much quicker to load. Pitty though, that crappy MS has cornered the market, would rather not support them, but am not techy enough to go for alternatives .

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Feb 01, 05 3:20 pm Post subject:

judyofthewoods wrote:

am not techy enough to go for alternatives .

You don't have to be techy both Opera and firefox are very easy to set up and free (although the free version of opera displays ads).

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