Everybody is picking on AOL this week. MSNBC had a huge story on the poor quality of AOL's customer service and (as Rick pointed out) AOL made it to number one on PC World's "25 Worst Tech Products of All Time."
So, what's wrong with AOL? I will use an analogy to explain. Imagine a small pioneer road in the early 1800s. In the early days of roads the shortest distance between two points was any path that started and ended in convenient locales. How fast the road was to travel, the smoothness of the road, and the incline made little difference.
Imagine that AOL is this small pioneer road in the early days of the Internet. Over time new roads were built. Technology, new machinery and better understanding have lead to smoother roads, shorter journeys and faster speeds. Now imagine a modern Interstate. An Interstate provides the same ability to travel from point A to point B, but the speed limit is 75 the course is straight and the path is made of concrete. The Interstate is like those Internet Service Providers who listened to their customers complaints about their trips on the rough pioneer roads considered those complaints when developing their services.
Now, AOL (the old pioneer road folks) can do one of two things. They can improve their service, or they can change their road into a toll road and give away free 1000 hour memberships to their toll roads then create an expensive and prolific advertising program to tell everyone on the Interstate what they are missing. When this plan doesn't go so well the pioneer road department develops a new way of making money since their tolls aren't covering it. They can up the price of the toll then sell billboards every 100 feet to willing advertisers.
When tolls continue to go down and travellers become even more scarce the pioneer road department decides to place speed bumps every 50 feet and these speed bumps are also marked by advertisers logos. This is done in the name of safety. The pioneer road department becomes even more confused when their profit contines to fall so they begin to offer more safety in the form of special troops to police the roads. These special police positions are offered to any policeman willing to pay the pioneer road department for the privelidge of patroling the pioneer roads. The police are told that they don't really have to do much, they just have to look like they are working. (These police are like the AOL security programs.)
While most people discover the ease and stress free Interstate (think I-70 across Kansas) there are still some who insist that the pioneer road is the best because they have been on it all their lives and change is too difficult. For those people, AOL is raising rates once again. If you try to leave they will do their best Clint Eastwood western impression to keep you on the road.
