I have had an AOL account since dial-up when you had to pay for it.

I kept that account even when you still had to pay for it and others were offering free email.

I worked at AOL-Time Warner (started just after the merger - don't ask) when some fool from AOL thought it made sense to use AOL as the corporate mail system rather than the Unix based system that was in place for years at Time Warner. I suggested at a group IT meeting that we use the Netscape platform internally because AOL owned it but I was quickly shot down. AOL email was the premiere product and that is what the new AOL overlords wanted to use for corporate email. So, a few weeks later I grabbed every combination of my name on my personal account (up to 5 were allowed) and saved the worst combination for my corporate account.

Over the years the accounts get on a spam list, I can't get them off, I give up on the account, and move onto the next one.

Today, is the day when I have reached my limit. My 5th email/username account is being spammed to death and AOL's spam blocking is no longer working to stop the barrage of crap. I received over 100 spam emails in my inbox today. I am saddened by this turn of events because the last email is mylastname@aol.com, the best iteration, and it is now dead to me.

Friends/Family know my gmail account. Professionally (non-work account) I use a different gmail. But AOL was my first foray into email and I will miss it.

AOL is dead, long live AOL.