From: kludge@panix.com   
      
   Theo   wrote:   
   >Someone with more US knowledge please correct me, but I think AOL dialup was   
   >a service that ran over the top of your phone service, which you got from   
   >your local phone company.  That meant you could dial in from anywhere with a   
   >phone connection.   
      
   All dialup services were like this.   
      
   I called with my modem over a phone line into Panix to get a shell prompt.   
   I called with my modem into my machine at work to fix thing that broke.   
   You could call from anywhere with a phone connection to anywhere else with   
   a phone connectionn as long as you had a modem on either end.   
      
   >To move into broadband they couldn't have had a national service like they   
   >did with dialup, they needed the phone company to install DSL modems or   
   >fiber in your particular area.  That means it was (and remains) a very   
   >piecemeal picture based on who offers service in your area.  AOL wouldn't   
   >be bringing anything to the table for that beyond a brand name and access to   
   >a small amount of non-internet content, and it wasn't worth doing that   
   >piecemeal.   
      
   AOL wasn't an ISP and they weren't selling end to end services.  That was   
   not their business model.  They were a multi-user messaging service, and   
   when they wanted to provide some other service, they bought companies that   
   provided that service.   
   --scott   
   --   
   "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)