There is probably no reason for AOL's continued existance. Local ISPs can do a better job for less money and without the jaring, screw the customer schemes of America On Line.
The latest flap with the instant messages highlights their lack of an ethical base in business practices. Its a lot like what happens when communists decide to run a business. In fact, the AOL representative who tried to talk me into keeping the service identified himself as "Scha" He then spelled it for me "Che". I asked him if this wasn't just like the name of the heroic Communist Freedom Fighter and he replied that he was named after him.
Aside from privacy AOL also lacks respect for tangible property. Some time ago, I found that $99 had been subtracted from my credit card. Aol informed me that I was now a member of AOL autovantage. The claim was that I had cashed an AOL check that gave them permission to raid my credit card. In fact, I had a firm policy of never opening envelops from AOL I reported this to the FTC and soon received a call from a local police detective. It seems that the sole response of FTC is to relay such reports to the police department of the victim and to the AOL local jurisdiction in Washington, DC.
The police detective told me that he spends a great part of his day chasing down AOL credit card fraud and getting refunds for the victims. He was relieved that I had secured my own refund and said he would move on to the next person on the list. AOL avoids criminal penalties by claiming that the credit card raids are the result of accidental billings.
AOL owes its current success to mass advertising and those little discs they drop in your mail box. Around here, they even leave stacks of AOL CD/ROMs in the post office. They make challenging pistol targets but otherwise, fail to satisfy,in that they do not shatter when hit.
I hang them in the garden to scare away birds.