In a message dated 12/5/2001 8:29:02 PM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

> In the  meantime, how could you abandon AOL???  HAVE you abandoned AOL, or
>  are you only planning to do so???

Ah, well. Sad sad story ... one filled with pathos and spam spam spam. I
think AOL has lost focus as to its main (well, first, anyway) mission --
providing good Internet Service --  since the merger with Time Warner.

First, it became impossible to connect - it routinely took two or three tries
with unresponsive access numbers, connection failures, and just plain dead
air. Then, after having finally accessed the Internet, I was booted off the
air more times than not. Mail arrives hours late.  Finally, my mailbox has
become overwhelmed with messages about how to enlarge various parts of my
anatomy, offers of rendezvous with various barnyard animals, and great deals
on viagra. Not to mention that poor soul from Nigeria who needs help
safeguarding his $1.8 Million in ill-gotten gains from local warlords, or
whatever.

With regard to spam, over the past month I have added all these to my mail
controls and forward them to "TOSSpam" (for domains) or "TOSEmail1" (for aol
spam). Nothing seems to have made a difference. Since the spammers have
unique email addresses, it is difficult to stop it from coming through.

Att Worldnet has consistent and easy access, I never get booted off, it's
speedy and web-based, so I can screen mail on the Internet before downloading
it to Outlook Express (great for all those viruses that love Outlook
Express). The kicker was that it was rated #1 by the readers of PC Magazine
-- my bible. I am giving it a try. It seems to be working fine.

That being said, it will take months to convert all of my stuff over. I am
running parallel ISPs at the moment. So my AOL is still functional, Ralph. At
least for a while.

Mizzy Worldnet