Pass me my coaster…I mean, my AOL disc.

I wrote this on December 13, 2005 as the follow-up to Why America Online can bite me, which I wrote on December 11, 2005, long after I canceled my last AOL account. The letter from the BBB that’s reprinted here is in response to my complaint that AOL wanted to charge me $50 for an “early cancellation.”

I got another free trial from AOL in the mail today, and an email from the BBB about AOL tonight. AOL sent so many discs they had to pack them in a box. I haven’t unwrapped this cool “Alumni Gift” yet but I’ll look at the discs soon just for fun. I wish I had a spare computer to wreck with their latest offerings just to remind myself how much AOL sucks. The “gift”-box is a monstrous 5 1/2″ x 5 1/2″ by 3/4″. Apparently it’s their Greatest Hits collection. There’s three big lies written across the front of it:

Why America Online can bite me.

I wrote this on December 11, 2005, two months after I canceled my free trials of AOL.

AOL is running the biggest scam the world’s ever seen: thee ‘free’ 50-day trial. I got taken in by it back in August, 2005, when I spied free AOL discs on a magazine rack where I worked. I took a disc — several, actually — because my ISP was WalMart Connect, which is really AOL 2.SL0W.

With WMC I’d click a link, feed the cat, use the bathroom, and if I was lucky, the page would almost be done loading. In contrast, I popped AOL’s disc in, cooked dinner, and even redecorated my house while it installed. As if that wasn’t enough wasted time, the final screen connecting me to their server crashed so I had to start all over again. What should take 20 minutes took me over 3 hours: running an install disc.