"AOHell"

1/07/02 8:19pm So easy to use, no wonder it`s #1 - my @ss. For six years, my family has trusted in America Online to provide us with Internet access and E-mail capabilities. During the late nineties, AOL`s popularity soared. It literally took a good thirty minutes to connect, having to wait through constant busy signals because of the company`s inability to expand their systems along with the increasing demands. Eventually, AOL provided more accessnumbers, sufficient in handling the large number of customers from big city areas such as Houston and Dallas. During that same time span, however, it was brought to the public`s attention that AOL was selling their member`s screen names to other companies. This resulted in thousands of unwanted junk mail from other companies, just so AOL can make a few more bucks. Doesn`t sound like great customer service to me...
After a few mergers and buy-outs, the conglomerate known as AOL Time Warner once again imposes distress on loyal customers such as myself. Road-runner, the cable Internet provider owned by AOL Time Warner, has continually offered poor services to the Waco Park community because of their unexpected escalation in demand. At one point, it was virtually impossible to surf the net during peak hours because so many people were using the Road-runner services. Unless it was past 2:00am in the morning, it was actually faster to resort to dial-up connection then to use Road-runner`s bogged down cable connection.
Now, I sit here in my Houston home, relying yet again on AOL`s dial-up service. The connection is often disrupted for no apparent reason, kicking me off of my very important AA updates and Instant Message conversations. Furthermore, I can`t stand the numerous banners and advertisement crap that pops up every time I sign on to AOL or AIM; each time, having to click "no thanks". A company with such poor reputation for services does not deserve a polite retort to turn down irritating advertisement ploys each time I sign on...
It frustrates me to no end that AOL boasts about being #1, yet the quality of their service is incessantly poor. Rather than spending so much money on advertising and marketing a brand that is already well known to everyone and their mamas, AOL Time Warner should direct some of their efforts into expanding dial up access numbers and increasing cable connection bandwidths. And I, on the other hand, should writea letter of complaint to AOL Time Warner, rather than displaying my disgust here on AA. I know I`m not the only one who feels this way, so I encourage everyone to speak out against AOL Time Warner. Perhaps then, we can start to expect better services for the amount of $$ we dish out to an already wealthy company such as AOL Time Warner.