Appearance: Used
Functionality: Working

Description:
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As pictured, an AOL Floppy disk – Version 3.0.

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Stock#:C2053.CQ#.1


Details from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL:

Formerly called
Control Video Corporation (1983–85)
Quantum Computer Services (1985–91)
America Online (1991–2009)
Type
Subsidiary
Founded 1983; 35 years ago (as Control Video Corporation)
2009 (as AOL Inc.)
Founders
Marc Seriff
Steve Case
Jim Kimsey
William von Meister
(As Control Video Corporation)

Headquarters 770 Broadway
New York City, New York 10003
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Tim Armstrong
(CEO[1])
Services Web portal and online services
Owner Verizon
Number of employees
5,600
Parent Independent
(1983-2000, 2006-2015)
(AOL) Time Warner
(2000–2006)
Verizon Communications (2015–present)
Oath Inc.
(2017–present)

AOL (formerly a company known as AOL Inc., originally known as America Online, and stylized as Aol.) is a web portal and online service provider based in New York. It is a brand marketed by Oath, a subsidiary of Verizon Communications.

The service traces its history to an online service known as PlayNET, which hosted multi-player games for the Commodore 64. PlayNET licensed their software to a new service, Quantum Link (Q-Link), who went online in November 1985. PlayNET shut down shortly thereafter. The initial Q-Link service was similar to the original PlayNET, but over time Q-Link added many new services. When a new IBM PC client was released, the company focussed on the non-gaming services and launched it under the name America Online. The original Q-Link was shut down on 1 November 1995, while AOL grew to become the largest online service, shoving aside established players like CompuServe and The Source. By 1995, AOL had about 20 million active users.

AOL was one of the early pioneers of the Internet in the mid-1990s, and the most recognized brand on the web in the United States. It originally provided a dial-up service to millions of Americans, as well as providing a web portal, e-mail, instant messaging and later a web browser following its purchase of Netscape. At the height of its popularity, it purchased the media conglomerate Time Warner in the largest merger in U.S. history. AOL rapidly declined thereafter, partly due to the decline of dial-up and rise of broadband.[2] AOL was eventually spun off from Time Warner in 2009, with Tim Armstrong appointed the new CEO. Under his leadership, the company invested in media brands and advertising technologies.

1983–91: Early years
AOL began in 1983, as a short-lived venture called Control Video Corporation (or CVC), founded by Bill von Meister. Its sole product was an online service called GameLine for the Atari 2600 video game console, after von Meister's idea of buying music on demand was rejected by Warner Bros.[5] Subscribers bought a modem from the company for US$49.95 and paid a one-time US$15 setup fee. GameLine permitted subscribers to temporarily download games and keep track of high scores, at a cost of US$1 per game.[6] The telephone disconnected and the downloaded game would remain in GameLine's Master Module and playable until the user turned off the console or downloaded another game.

In January 1983, Steve Case was hired as a marketing consultant for Control Video on the recommendation of his brother, investment banker Dan Case. In May 1983, Jim Kimsey became a manufacturing consultant for Control Video, which was near bankruptcy. Kimsey was brought in by his West Point friend Frank Caufield, an investor in the company.[5] In early 1985, von Meister left the company.[7]

On May 24, 1985, Quantum Computer Services, an online services company, was founded by Jim Kimsey from the remnants of Control Video, with Kimsey as Chief Executive Officer, and Marc Seriff as Chief Technology Officer. The technical team consisted of Marc Seriff, Tom Ralston, Ray Heinrich, Steve Trus, Ken Huntsman, Janet Hunter, Dave Brown, Craig Dykstra, Doug Coward, and Mike Ficco. In 1987, Case was promoted again to executive vice-president. Kimsey soon began to groom Case to take over the role of CEO, which he did when Kimsey retired in 1991.[7]

Kimsey changed the company's strategy, and in 1985, launched a dedicated online service for Commodore 64 and 128 computers, originally called Quantum Link ("Q-Link" for short).[6] The Quantum Link software was based on software licensed from PlayNet, Inc, (founded in 1983 by Howard Goldberg and Dave Panzl). The service was different from other online services as it used the computing power of the Commodore 64 and the Apple II rather than just a "dumb" terminal. It passed tokens back and forth and provided a fixed price service tailored for home users. In May 1988, Quantum and Apple launched AppleLink Personal Edition for Apple II[8] and Macintosh computers. In August 1988, Quantum launched PC Link, a service for IBM-compatible PCs developed in a joint venture with the Tandy Corporation. After the company parted ways with Apple in October 1989, Quantum changed the service's name to America Online.[9][10] Case promoted and sold AOL as the online service for people unfamiliar with computers, in contrast to CompuServe, which was well established in the technical community.[7]

From the beginning, AOL included online games in its mix of products; many classic and casual games were included in the original PlayNet software system. In the early years of AOL the company introduced many innovative online interactive titles and games, including:

Graphical chat environments Habitat (1986–1988) and Club Caribe (1988) from LucasArts.
The first online interactive fiction series QuantumLink Serial by Tracy Reed (1988).
Quantum Space, the first fully automated play-by-mail game game (1989–1991).
1991–2006: Internet age, Time Warner merger

First AOL logo as "America Online", used from 1991 to 2005.
In February 1991, AOL for DOS was launched using a GeoWorks interface followed a year later by AOL for Windows.[6] This coincided with growth in pay-based online services, like Prodigy, CompuServe, and GEnie. 1991 also saw the introduction of an original Dungeons & Dragons title called Neverwinter Nights from Stormfront Studios; which was one of the first Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games to depict the adventure with graphics instead of text.[11]

During the early 1990s, the average subscription lasted for about 25 months and accounted for $350 in total revenue.[12] Advertisements invited modem owners to "Try America Online FREE", promising free software and trial membership.[13] AOL discontinued Q-Link and PC Link in late 1994. In September 1993, AOL added Usenet access to its features.[14] This is commonly referred to as the "Eternal September", as Usenet's cycle of new users was previously dominated by smaller numbers of college and university freshmen gaining access in September and taking a few weeks to acclimate. This also coincided with a new "carpet bombing" marketing campaign by CMO Jan Brandt to distribute as many free trial AOL trial disks as possible through nonconventional distribution partners. At one point, 50% of the CDs produced worldwide had an AOL logo.[15] AOL quickly surpassed GEnie, and by the mid-1990s, it passed Prodigy (which for several years allowed AOL advertising) and CompuServe.[7]

Over the next several years, AOL launched services with the National Education Association, the American Federation of Teachers, National Geographic, the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, Pearson, Scholastic, ASCD, NSBA, NCTE, Discovery Networks, Turner Education Services (CNN Newsroom), NPR, The Princeton Review, Stanley Kaplan, Barron's, Highlights for Kids, the U.S. Department of Education, and many other education providers. AOL offered the first real-time homework help service (the Teacher Pager—1990; prior to this, AOL provided homework help bulletin boards), the first service by children, for children (Kids Only Online, 1991), the first online service for parents (the Parents Information Network, 1991), the first online courses (1988), the first omnibus service for teachers (the Teachers' Information Network, 1990), the first online exhibit (Library of Congress, 1991), the first parental controls, and many other online education firsts.[16]


America Online 2.0 software for Microsoft Windows (1994)
AOL charged its users an hourly fee until December 1996,[17] when the company changed to a flat monthly rate of $19.95.[6] During this time, AOL connections would be flooded with users trying to get on, and many canceled their accounts due to constant busy signals. A commercial featuring Steve Case telling people AOL was working day and night to fix the problem was made. Within three years, AOL's user base grew to 10 million people. In 1995 AOL was headquartered at 8619 Westwood Center Drive in the Tysons Corner CDP in unincorporated Fairfax County, Virginia,[18][19] near the Town of Vienna.