Well It Looks Like Another AOL Favorite Has Bit The Dust!

I'm talking about AOL's download center! There used to be a time when AOL has a place where you could download all types of good and FREE downloads. AOL members could even upload their own works to the download library so that other people could download them and what made it especially good was that AOL scanned the uploads to make sure that there were no virus's on the upload.

What seems to have taken the place of AOL's download center is something called the Download Squad - which I don't particularly like! Maybe I will just have to get used to it?

There still seems to be a way to get to some of the files at the old download center on AOL but the problem is that I'm only able to get to certain files as opposed to having access to all the different types of files available to download.

I may have to work on this to see if I can get to the complete old download center on AOL because I miss it very much!

AOL Is Free?

I was talking to someone about AOL now being free and they didn't even know about it!

For those of you that don't know, AOL is now being offered for free. All you have to do is go to their website and sign up.

When you do sign up you will be given a free AOL email address for yourself and you can participate in the AOL message boards. You will also have access to a wealth of information that AOL has.

About the only thing that you do not get - at least I think you don't get - is your own AOL member webpages.

Why is AOL offering it's services for free? My guess is that they feel that they can make more money by allowing advertisers to advertise on the AOL pages.

In any case while AOL is being offered for free there are still many people who still belong to their paid service.

Another AOLer Has Moved Their AOL Journal

Here is a link to a blog post from someone that moved their AOL Journal to another blog site - in this case Blogger.com.

It seems that they were dis-heartened by the fact that AOL has now put banner ads at the top of their AOL Journals.

Be Sure To Watch Out For This Kind Of Illegitmate Email!

Here is a copy of an email sent to an AOL member:

Welcome to AOL Customer Support

Dear AOL Member

Contact Us

Have a question regarding your AOL account?

Contact us now!

E-mail your questions: Call us at 1-888-265-8005

It has come to our attention that your AOL Billing Information records are out of date. That requires you to update the Billing Information. Failure to update your records will result in account termination. Please update your records within 24 hours. Once you have updated your account records, your AOL session will not be interrupted and will continue as normal. Failure to update will result in cancellation of service, Terms of Service (TOS) violations or future billing problems. You must click the link below and enter your login information on the following page to confirm your Billing Information records..

Thank You


Click here to update your account

Of course the link that was provided did not go to any offical AOL site that I know of!

If you are an AOL member and you get this kind of email in your email box, DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK that is included with that email. Contact AOL DIRECTLY!.

AOL has said itself that their staff will never ask you for your log-in information!

Those "Ugly" AOL Banners?

Well it seems as though AOL members who have their websites hosted on AOL are starting to see those "ugly" AOL banners at the top of their

websites. According to most of the AOL members they did not get an option to have these AOL banners on their AOL site - the banners just started

appearing - and a lot of AOLers are upset about it! They want those AOL banners removed and they want them removed NOW!

I have seen it posted that people have said that they have had their pages on AOL for years without the AOL banners and they wonder why AOL would

change this to include the banners. A lot of people are saying that they are fed up with AOL and are considering moving their pages to another site.

Others have posted "solutions" to getting rid of the AOL banners but none of those ideas / suggestions are working on a permanent basis.

I tried looking online for some answer or maybe some information about AOL announcing that they would start adding their AOL banners to members

websites but so far I can't find anything about it except the link below which goes to one of the AOL boards where people are posting about how upset

they are that this kind of thing is happening to them.

Those "Ugly" AOL Banners!

AOL Member Pleads - "Please Remove The AOL Banners
From My AOL Website!"

AOLers Want Those AOL Banners REMOVED From Their AOL Websites!

AOL Subscribers Have To Be Very Careful!

There are always numerous attempts by "scammers" to get your AOL information. For example here is a recent email sent to an AOL member:

Dear Valued AOL member,

In an effort to keep our records up to date, please take a moment to verify that your contact information on file is correct. You can update your information online anytime at AOL Keyword: My Account or on the web at bill.aol.com

If you wish to discuss your account with a billing consultant online please visit AOL Keyword: Get Billing Help.

Once you have updated your account records your AOL session will not be interrupted and will continue as normal . Failure to update will result in cancellation of service, Terms of Service (TOS) violations or future problems.

Sincerely,
Member Services
AOL LLC

This is NOT a legitimate email from AOL!

AOL itself says that they will never ask you for your password or log in information!

So if you get this email please be advised that it is not a legitimate email from AOL!

Another AOL "Secret" Has Seem To Bitten The Dust!

A lot of people were unhappy with the new message board formats on AOL because they required a lot more power on a persons' computer. A few "helpful" AOL'ers provided "back door" links to where the old message board formats could be located. The old format required less of a computer and that is why a lot of people favored them.

Well it now seems that the "back doors" are closing up! The links that were being provided are no longer working. A few people have claimed that they still have a link that will lead to the old format of the message boards - but they don't seem to be working either.

Is This Another Attempt At A Scam?

Here is a copy of a recent email that I got:

Your AOL Billing Information records are out of date.
From:
Reply To:
To:
CC:
BCC:
Sent on:


Sent from the Internet (Details)
Internet Address Card Attached

Welcome to AOL Customer Support


During our regularly scheduled account maintenance and verification procedures, we have detected a slight error in your account information.

This might be due to either of the following reasons:

1. A recent change in your personal information ( i.e.change of address).
   
   
   
2. Submiting invalid information during the initial sign up process.
   
   
   
3. An inability to accurately verify your selected option of payment due to an internal error within our processors.

Due to this, we require you to confirm and verify your account information by clicking the link below:

Click here to verify your account

If your account information is not confirmed and verified within a certain period of time then your ability to access your account would become restricted.

Thank you
This is an automatic message. Please do not reply.

Contact Us
Have a question regarding your AOL account?

Contact us now!

E-mail your questions
Call us at 1-888-xxx-xxxx

Now the first thing that I did was to put my cursor over the blue link to see the url of the link. There was "AOL" included in the link but my mind still said no. One of the reasons why this "warning" bell went off is because legitimate AOL email has a different kind of icon.

So I think that it is another attempt at "phishing" whereas you get an email that looks legitimate but it really is not.

If you are unsure about any email that asks you for your personal or password information you should NOT click on the link that is provided.

AOL And Usenet Newsgroups!

There was a time when AOL members had free access to most of the Usenet newsgroups.

In case you didn't know, Usenet newsgroups are message forums where you can post messages, questions and answer other peoples' messages.

But AOL has since cancelled this access to the newsgroups.

The alternative is to join the Google Groups where the access is free BUT you don't get access to the binary newsgroups where you can post pictures (and see / access them as well).

There are some free newsgroup servers out there but the list of them is ever-changing. Some of them are not reliable and some of them allow you to read the posts but you can't post to the newsgroup(s).

I'm currently investigating getting netscape access to the newsgroups. I had netscape a long time ago and remember being able to access some of the usenet newsgroups. The current version of netscape doesn't allow for access to the newsgroups so I had to download an older version of it which I did. Now I'm fooling around with the newsgroups that I have been able to subscibe to. In order to post to these newsgroups you need to have an email account. You can register with netscape to get an email account - which I am trying to do now but I keep getting cut off.

Of course there are newsgroup servers where you can pay to get access to the newsgroups too.