"... Bob offered an email client with which a user could subscribe to MCI Mail, a dial-up email account.The price was $5.00 per month to send up to 15 emails per month. Each email was limited to 5000 characters, and each additional email after the limit was reached was an additional 45 cents.
A toll-free phone number had to be called to set up the account..."
Plus I am sure you were getting hit with a minimum long distance call from your local carrier every time you sent one though? Man I enjoyed when Netscape came out and I didn’t have to pay AOL “on top of” the long distance rate from our rural area.