Since he’s complaining about people who brag on FB, He must have bragged a lot on AOL.
I didn’t connect the original version of the name to AOL at all, and had no idea what the fourth panel meant until I read Bill’s headline.
Okay but how do you brag on AOL? It is/was an ISP and nothing more right? It would be like me saying I’m bragging on my Wifi.
Mark M. I think AOL used to host user forums. I never used it as I always found some way to leach peripherally to some university or another for my networking needs but I think it was many peoples first experience with on-line communities.
I feel like a geezer for knowing this, but AOL (and Compuserve) were self contained online communities before most people were on the Internet. You dialed in and got AOL mail, AOL chat rooms, AOL games, etc. etc.They became a portal instead of a self-contained site after user friendly web browsers took off.
I know people who get on Facebook to tell you their problems.
Not “most”. AOL was a standalone service before the web existed. Technically the Internet existed, but it was basically email and file transfer. (Also true of CompuServe, GEnie, Prodigy, etc. I used to be a GEnie sysop, if anyone remembers that online service.)
Yes, our school district had everyone on AOL when computers first became used for communication purposes. I remember being on ‘boards’ about scuba diving.
All you AOL whippersnappers — I was on Home Plato back in 1980.
(But only because my housemate at the time was computer savvy, and working for the company. Almost forty years later, I’m still only a marginally competent computer klutz. But I have my memories of wasting most of a Saturday playing a slow dialup version of The King’s Mission.)
AOL started allowing access to Usenet in September 1993, causing the Eternal September.
I think she is saying he bragged on AOL, not that he complained there.
I re.e.ber AOL. That was the ompany that used to send these free shiny coasters in the mail.
Sigh. “Remember” AOL.
AOL had chat rooms, forums, news, sports, stocks, everything. It’s own little world separate from the Worldwide Web. It really anticipated social networks. Then they decided to get rid of all that stuff and just turn it into a website. And it died.
American People/Link
@Shrug, I was on PLATO at the University of Illinois from 1974-1977. PLATO had chat rooms, instant messaging, forums, touch screens and multiplayer games long before the rest of the world.
carlfink, the Internet also had netnews from the mid 80s.
Heh. I’ve known people who seemingly constantly change email addresses, as their providers go out of business, etc., while I still use my AOL email.
Remember the Christmas Modem Kids?
I was an extremely early member of both yahoo and hotmail free email systems. Yahoo I use for “throw-away” situations like er here for instance. Hotmail has been my main email since way before it was Microsoft Outlook.
Comics I Don't Understand 
Since he’s complaining about people who brag on FB, He must have bragged a lot on AOL.
I didn’t connect the original version of the name to AOL at all, and had no idea what the fourth panel meant until I read Bill’s headline.
Okay but how do you brag on AOL? It is/was an ISP and nothing more right? It would be like me saying I’m bragging on my Wifi.
Mark M. I think AOL used to host user forums. I never used it as I always found some way to leach peripherally to some university or another for my networking needs but I think it was many peoples first experience with on-line communities.
I feel like a geezer for knowing this, but AOL (and Compuserve) were self contained online communities before most people were on the Internet. You dialed in and got AOL mail, AOL chat rooms, AOL games, etc. etc.They became a portal instead of a self-contained site after user friendly web browsers took off.
I know people who get on Facebook to tell you their problems.
Not “most”. AOL was a standalone service before the web existed. Technically the Internet existed, but it was basically email and file transfer. (Also true of CompuServe, GEnie, Prodigy, etc. I used to be a GEnie sysop, if anyone remembers that online service.)
Yes, our school district had everyone on AOL when computers first became used for communication purposes. I remember being on ‘boards’ about scuba diving.
All you AOL whippersnappers — I was on Home Plato back in 1980.
(But only because my housemate at the time was computer savvy, and working for the company. Almost forty years later, I’m still only a marginally competent computer klutz. But I have my memories of wasting most of a Saturday playing a slow dialup version of The King’s Mission.)
AOL started allowing access to Usenet in September 1993, causing the Eternal September.
I think she is saying he bragged on AOL, not that he complained there.
I re.e.ber AOL. That was the ompany that used to send these free shiny coasters in the mail.
Sigh. “Remember” AOL.
AOL had chat rooms, forums, news, sports, stocks, everything. It’s own little world separate from the Worldwide Web. It really anticipated social networks. Then they decided to get rid of all that stuff and just turn it into a website. And it died.
American People/Link
@Shrug, I was on PLATO at the University of Illinois from 1974-1977. PLATO had chat rooms, instant messaging, forums, touch screens and multiplayer games long before the rest of the world.
carlfink, the Internet also had netnews from the mid 80s.
Heh. I’ve known people who seemingly constantly change email addresses, as their providers go out of business, etc., while I still use my AOL email.
Remember the Christmas Modem Kids?
I was an extremely early member of both yahoo and hotmail free email systems. Yahoo I use for “throw-away” situations like er here for instance. Hotmail has been my main email since way before it was Microsoft Outlook.