I was surprised to read on the BBC website this week that AOL is shutting down its dial-up internet service in the US. I had to double-check it wasn’t April 1, or an old article, but apparently there are still people – although ‘fewer than 300,000’ – using a dial-up only internet service in the US.
If you want to, you can still listen to those characteristic beeps and whirring noises as you connect to the internet via a phone line in North America – but only until 30 September when the service will no longer be available on AOL plans.
Demise of dial-up
Launched more than 30 years ago and long since overtaken by faster broadband services, the eventual demise of dial-up is a reminder that legacy tech is frequently in use – and generating revenue – for much longer that we imagine, and that winding down communications services can be a very long process!
And if you’re trying to remember what happened to AOL UK, that was bought by Carphone Warehouse (Now Currys plc) for £370m in 2006, when it was the UK’s third largest internet provider and had 600,000 dial-up customers.
Related stories
Nostalgic for more tales of the history of the internet? I was also amused by the recollections of Ian Taylor MBE, Minister for Science, Space and Technology in John Major’s government, on the first use of the internet by UK government and fascinated by our feature The story of the Internet from the pioneers who made it happen.