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AOL is shutting down the dial-up service that introduced homes across the US to the internet.<\/p>\n
The offering, which connects to the internet via a phone line, launched more than 30 years ago and was known for its chirpy whirring start-up sound, memorialised in the 1998 film You’ve Got Mail. <\/p>\n
But it has long since been eclipsed by faster alternatives. <\/p>\n
Fewer than 300,000 people in the US reported having only a dial-up internet connection, compared with more than 300 million with broadband service, according to 2023 government estimates. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
“AOL routinely evaluates its products and services and has decided to discontinue Dial-up Internet, ” the company said in a notice to subscribers in the US and Canada on Friday. <\/p>\n
The service will no longer be available in AOL plans as of 30 September, the firm added.<\/p>\n
AOL sold its UK arm in 2006<\/a>.<\/p>\n “Thanks for the memories RIP,” wrote AOL co-founder Steve Case, who presided over the firm’s growth in the 1990s.<\/p>\n The company was known for luring customers by mailing them free trial discs<\/a> and at one point claimed ownership of nearly 40% of the time that Americans spent online<\/a>.<\/p>\n AOL, which merged with Time Warner in 2000 in a deal widely deemed disastrous, boasted more than 30 million subscribers at the end of 2001<\/a>.<\/p>\n But its lead had already started to be eroded, as broadband offerings from rivals started to gain traction. As early as 2003, obituaries for dial-up service had begun, as in a Wall Street Journal article that declared<\/a>: “It’s official. Dial-up is dying.”<\/p>\n