15 replies to this topic

[BotNot]

I just wanted to publicly announce I am free of AOL and their pestering,
intrusive, overbearing henchmen( Viewpoint / Real pl/ And Quick Time).

I admit I enjoyed free ISP, at first.
As time passed and my attention grew ever stronger attuned to the programs
running behind the scenes. My joy in free-surf wilted away.
In its place a new emotion emerged ParanoidnauseainducingRageimploding fever. ) holds true
NOTHING WORTH HAVING IS TOTALLY FREE.

Free AOL
+ headaches and twitching
________
Balance Due:
Personal privacy "pay up" with PAYPAL

BREAK POINT HERE...(Camel back fractured) (last straw)
I started interupting the "required"
AOL upddate sessions " while AOL is updating your system, dont unplug this update or else....... we will turn off the ventilation system....to your home..." ect.)
their refusal to let me cancel my account led to an odd rash near my l elbow, which doctors, still to this day cannot explain..(suggest if you must use AOL, wear protective gear.) IM KIDDING ON THAT ONE SARCASM
And what of the landfill overpopulating shinny disks...... Im sure enough sick of the never ending stream
of disks clogging my mailbox. And I like SHINY things!!!!!Not any more.

Why must they keep DISGUISED CASHE of my daily web activity?
Why did my browser crash every time i disabled Veiwpoint or Quick time

AOL is TimeWarner is Comcast.is Roadrunner is......Disney is ....it goes on....
:zipped:
It looks like a monopoly, acts like a monopoly
Anyone in its way gets wiped off, not at all unlike a smashed bug
being wiped off the windshield of a highway driven vehicle.

So, fed up I grabbed AOL like a fresh water fish,
Lopped its head off, GUTTED it, and fed it to my cat.
Dont worry, he's fine. Cats have a digestive system used to digesting rodents, bugs
and such. AOL was last seen in a small circular pile with wisps of steam rising off it..
In my cats litter box.

Now I pay a small amount for isp;
I use Firefox Preview (OUTSTANDING and secure, too)
I enjoy paranoid-free surfing every minute Im online,
except for the dial up......thats another story and I'm out of breath.

Note , I am aware of AOL having ties with the mozilla foundation ect.
non concern here, that is no problem, yet.........

:zipped:

Attached Files

•  av_31204.jpg   3.78KB   14 downloads

[macaroo]

Congratulations on breaking the bonds of AOL. Now try to get them from charging you CC! Also good luck on trying to remove AOL from your machine. I tell people it is like a virus. It will seep into every crack and nook of your machine.

[Tuxedo Jack]

Good job.

If you've broken your contract and they still charge, you can sue them in small-claims court, and odds are they'll settle.

[pomp]

lol, AOL i used them in my dial up days, thank god they aren't my isp anymore

[Trilobite]

AOL charged me as well (I believe around $40) for their so-called ‘free trial’ that came with my Dell.

I do NOT recommend AOL to anyone…in my opinion they are no better than virus or malware writers...if you have AOL, dump it as fast as you can!

[Archon_Wing]

lol, AOL i used them in my dial up days, thank god they aren't my isp  anymore

Thank God AOL isn't an ISP anymore. Whoops.

Props to Botnot; you have exited Hell. Now you can head toward a place where you can actualy surf the net at your money's worth. Welcome to the real internet! (Watch out for spyware though)

Edited by Archon_Wing, 08 October 2004 - 07:46 PM.

[BotNot]

Many thanks to those who offered their kind words of praise and shared enthuisiasm.

I'm comfortable with the reduced level of AOL "sludge" still brewing in the recessed bowels of my registry. Actuallly I can thank AOL, due to the numerous times I got fed
up w/thier stench I repeatedly engaged in an ensuing frenzied removal of all I could find concerniing AOL,
I learned a great deal about win98 and W2k filing systems and registry rules.
They were and still are an exquisit example of Spyware in perhaps it s most dangerous
form : Premeditated evolutionary growth /conquering by nature/ cloaked by a thick
vie of customer concern and sickeningly false "values". I think they are the essence of why the world appears to be on a "bobsled to Hell" But hey, I've been deprogrammed!!!!!!lol

Appreciate, as well the concern for possible liabilty in contractual obliigations,
I covered my end very carefully, easy to say, considering AOL. no worrys.

IS IT EVER REALLY DONE
Part of me knows "with out ever having known" that perhaps AOL goes somewhat
deeper than economics, further into _____ than understandable science....a sprititual...
scary @#$%?
HMMmmmmmm,?
eh , sounded good for a minute..

ALL JOKING ASIDE, youve been warned , proceed w/aol at own risk...

GO MOZILLA/FIREFOX PRE

Glad to be w/ SPYWAREINFO team...

Todays workshop phrase : "sarcastic ranting laced with seathng anger, burning rage, frustration overflows until brought to conlusion with unrational behavior."

[tennisjump]

could someone write a program called aol remover? like kazaa be gone to get rid of all of aol?

[VashonDude]

Good old AOHell... the only ISP I ever used where I had to logoff via Ctrl-Alt-Del at times.

-- LB

[LadyN]

Ok I am new to this site and I happen to use AOL. I have tried numerous times to cancel and swithch and they keep giving me free months. I would like to know more about what is wrong with AOL so I may make a better infomed decision.

[BotNot]

Ok I am new to this site and I happen to use AOL.    I have tried numerous times to cancel and swithch and they keep giving me free months. I would like to know more about what is wrong with AOL so I may make a better infomed decision.

My opinion is just that, an opinion and subjective. If AOL works well and you enjoy it.
dont change it. I have personal privacy and freedom of choice issues:
I liked Free internet. I disliked the fact that they kept encripted and indexed accounts of my (and yours and anyone on AOL) sites I had been to on a daily basis. AOL stores my personal info /passcodes/sites visited/ preferences/last used applications(works/paint/winzipect) all on different files/under different names in a separate AOL location plus on my computer as well.
AOL never caused me any harm, financial or anything, but their persistence was maddening/pop up ads, forcing high speed bndwth/ on my dial up service was the biggest problem.
I called to cancel before my trial period ended, they talked me into using them for 2 more
months free/ I caved in / they then switched my account into a highspeed acct....
I dont have highspeed access...that caused contiunual modem resets/ network adapter rebuilds, oh man Im gettin frustrated thinkiing about it ...... 45 days later more than 10 calls informing them, yet there is still a highspeed account out there,
I will call and attempt to cancel in a couple days. ,, I use copper.net for ISP $10 mo
and downlloaded Firefox Preview web browser and reaaaalllyy like it.

btw when you eventually go to remove AOL from uninstall programs (control panel)
dont be suprised when you continually find AOL "reload" mines strewn about your computer, , Its AOLs version of Slash and Burn competition

[CompTutor]

There's a saying among the computer tutor crowd: "Friends don't let friends use AOL". Here is another reason why:

Yesterday I spent 8 (paid) hours trying to remove a Hijacker Trojan from an AOL computer. The behavior was that when we went to get mail, it worked; when we then went to the WWW, the program closed and restarted. No error messages to work with. AND no contact with the Internet to download fixes.

Fortunately I have had similar problems, so came with everything I could think of loaded on a Flash Drive to fix the sucker--except HiJackThis. See, every other time I've had the problem, I was able to get connectivity back with the do-it-yourself tools like SpyWareBlaster and SpyBot, etc., and then download the rest. But this one would not go away, and because I was on AOL I couldn't get a handle on the slippery little **** Finally I got smart (note the FINALLY?) and went into the www through IE, with AOL still logged on, of course. Suddenly I started getting all kinds of messages about the BHOs, etc. And now I know what direction to go today to remove it.

AOL makes me think of my parents in the 50s and 60s: you don't need to know, we pay the bills, just shut up and do it our way or get out.

So get out before the AOL environment locks you up in knots. Did AOL CAUSE the trojan? No, but it did NOTHING to prevent it. AND it did lots to prevent me fixin it--for hours. (Their shell prevents interaction with the software, and they DO NOT give anyone any more security from Trojans than any other browser--their Browser is not secure!) My client? He was a really hardline AOL lover--he is even getting AOL free because of his AOL credit card. And today we hook him up with another ISP!!!!!!

[canoeingkidd]

AOL charged me as well (I believe around $40) for their so-called ‘free trial’ that came with my Dell.

I do NOT recommend AOL to anyone…in my opinion they are no better than virus or malware writers...if you have AOL, dump it as fast as you can!

If you look at the fine print it says something to the effect of: "If you don't call us to cancel your account we'll just assume you want to keep AOL forever and we'll start charging you for it".

Kinda like the Terms of Service in an installation.

Edited by canoeingkidd, 17 October 2004 - 06:41 PM.

[CompTutor]

the fine print it says something to the effect of: "If you don't call us to cancel your account we'll just assume you want to keep AOL forever and we'll start charging you for it".

Yes, it says that. While many people who get the "free CDs" are not computer-or internet-savvy enough to READ it in the first place, or understand it in the second, it does sound self-explanatory. I work with a lot of seniors and newbies, and this is the way a large part of our population thinks--which is why AOL is doing it the way they do:

Firstly, you have to read the fine print to know when your 750 "free" hours begin and end--not 750 hours after you sign up, certainly, but at the beginning of the next billing cycle defined by AOL. Secondly, the way some people think, if they try it and then don't use it after their free hours are up--or don't use it at all--they won't get charged. (Never mind that they gave their charge account number to sign up--THEY DIDN'T USE AOL!)

BUT if you DO cancel the contract, if you trust that action and fail to write down the confirmation number, you can continue to get charged. And if you can't give them the confirmation number when you finally figure out you are still being charged every month--some people amaze me the way they don't check their credit card bills, honest to God!--you pay for yet another month before they actually cancel it. I have taught many seniors and newbies about the hazards of these "free" CDs--one woman had 3 AOL installations plus a CompuServe and Prodigy (this was a while back) and was paying each of them EVERY MONTH for 5-6 months before I went in to teach her how to use her computer!

I don't blame the trusting public--I blame the company using such shoddy tricks. They have been in business long enough to know EXACTLY what effect their marketing has on people, and they capitalize on it every minute!!!!!!!! THAT is why I don't like AOL--totally beside the cyclic problem of not being able to get on and getting kicked off. (I watch that in my classes: my students seem to go through this problem about every 18 months, then it improves, then gets bad again.)

I say again: Friends don't let friends use AOL!!!

[karynl]

we too are free of AOL, i found it very easy to give them the push, my story is my mum god bless her decided to buy a laptop, please bear in mind she dosn't know how to use one but she thought it would keep the grandkids happy in the school hols, so off she went the PC World ( the place where the devil lives) bought a laptop took it home and used the free AOL mins disc that came with it.

She was happy surfing along at snail pace when one of the grandkids mentioned she had got an email from AOL who advised she could have a faster cleaner broadband, and as many of us do she just signed up, never read the terms and conditions and then the problems started she could stay on-line for more than a few mins, so i called and logged many calls with the customer help line (thats a joke), anyway to cut a long story short my mum was 10days outside of her cooling off period and she was told very aggressivley that she could not cancel the DD because she would get a CCJ.

I then got involved, I work for BT and are quite aware of the whole broadband thing. I called the CS line and they told me that they had actually bought 12months line from BT up front in my mums name, now I know that is impossible to do. I got the name of the person who uttered the words and also I got his team leader to say the same thing, and that my friends is your get out of jail free card, once this has been said to you, (make sure you get the name of the person ) you need to look on the AOL web site under compliants and write to the head compliants person, ( if anyone want a copy of the letter i sent then let me know)send it recorded delivery and keep a copy as well. The outcome was 7 days later my mum got a phone call from the said compliants man, who said he was very sorry and cancelled my mums account there and then, he also gave her the cancellation code you need this, i checked this of course and the account has in deed been cancelled.

I also mentioned that her rights had been abused and the local trading standards also had a copy of the letter.

HAPPY DAYS

[Dodge]

I had trouble wit AOL, regular freezes, crashes you name it it just about happened. Loads of calls and messages to live help telling them about the problems All i got was 'please try reinstalling AOL or 'please delete the cache' Tried both like 4567890 times and still the regular sound of 'GOODBYE' GRRRRRR used to get me so mad. Thing that made me laugh the most tho was when they cut me off, 1 advisor said i couldnt go back on, the other said i couldnt either, but the 3rd 1 said i could lol. In the end i got so annoyed with AOL i had a right rant down the phone and said im pulling out of AOL and moving on, i was told i couldnt, i then asked to speak to a manager and got the responce 'im sorry you will have to write to our manager' I stood firm and demanded a migration code (YOU NEED THIS TO CODE TO GO OVER TO A NEW ISP ON BROADBAND) They said they wouldnt give it me as i wasin a contract, i told them i couldnt care less i have not signed nothing and i want the migration code now!!! i got it in the end but was told that i will still have to pay my monthly charge, i said i wont pay it and will cancel every future direct debit for AOL, they wasnt best pleased about that, but i dont care im now well clear of them cowboys.