A News Alert to AOL and Compuserve Mail Users - Your Opt In Subscriptions Are Being Blocked

July 03, 2005

By AHRC News Services

Does AOL stand for America Online or America Offline?

With emails being blocked on a gigantic scale, some are saying that AOL stands for America Offline.

There is a rising crescendo of complaints from across the country and around the world. Victims included Harvard University and Earthlink. Critics are describing AOL and their subsidiary, Compuserve's blocking of emails as violating free speech and a monopolistic power grab.

AOL says it is only trying to block spam - AOL claims to block 780 million spam emails every day.

But the critics argue that AOL is using this excuse to block legitimate emails of publishers and communications providers and to create a monopoly for itself

All it takes is for one AOL subscriber to take the lazy way out and to hit the spam button to opt out of a newsletter he subscribed to, and AOL will block all emails from that server - and all the other businesses banked with it. One report claims AOL is parsing the content of its members' emails and blocking them even if they merely *mention* a site that AOL disapproves of.

AHRC subscribers who use AOL or Compserver may have already been impacted by this AOL policy. They may not be receiving the AHRC newsletter. Or a subscriber may have sent an email to AHRC with an inquiry. AHRC could have answered it, but the subscriber may not have received the answer if AOL or Compuserve blocked it.

The only known solution at the moment is for a subscriber to switch from AOL or Compuserve to another mail provider , or to set up an alternative email account with another mail provder and update your email address on your AHRC user account.

AHRC regrets any inconvenience that AOL and Compuserve may have caused.

Related links

• Don't say no, just cancel your account and RUN! - In my opinion if you are serious about the internet then AOL is the LAST service you would use anyway. Netzero and others charge about half the price for the same service. Do yourself a favor and support TA by DUMPING AOL. - If all you want is free email then Google's GMail is far superior IMO. - Chris Founder -Textamerica.com

• Errant junk filters strike again - BriansBuzz.com

• AOL Filters Out Some Emails From ISP - Affected subscribers from Comcast, SBC, Roadrunner - CNet Tech News

• Disastrous News - AOL to offer free email - Webintegrations - United Kingdon

• We found it can be certain words in an e-mail title that are blocked, so opt in or not the AOL filters block them. - The other reason could be the isp you use to send the e-mail is banned by AOL or has a restricted limit. - Virtual Promote

• AOL Madness (Warn Your Friends) ..AOL "bounced" about 88% of the newsletters that had been sent to subscribers who use aol.com e-mail addresses. The problem was also severe at subsidiaries owned by AOL, including cs.com (which bounced 88%) and netscape.net (96%).

...[AOL's] filter simply deletes huge quantities of mail without ever delivering it...

If you have friends on AOL, you may wish to tell them about this so they'll know why their email is so unreliable. Of course, there's no guarantee they'll see your email, just as there's no guarantee that legitimate subscribers to this newsletter on AOL will get this issue....



• Well this is really cute (sarcasticly said) ATTBI just got merged with comcast and most of my family is on aol. so does this mean im not gonna be able to email them?

Now maybe AOL will realize why so many of us have left and gone to rr or cc. Family and friends cannot be contacted now -- maybe they will change too! - TechIMO Webdevelopment News

• ISP Wants AOL to Stop E-mail Block

• AOLControvosial Buddy List - Users who guard their online privacy carefully may also recoil at the thought that their online presence will be announced to other members anytime they send or are copied on an email. - Click Z Network

• AOL Denies Responsibility For Returned Harvard E-Mails

• AOL spam filters block e-mail from EarthLink and others - IT World.com - Spam-filtering software from America Online Inc. may have overstepped its bounds and blocked e-mail from customers of Internet service provider EarthLink Inc. for more than a week, resulting in potentially more than 1 million messages that were undelivered and lost for good.

• AOL lands on spam blacklist - If you're an AOL user and your emails aren't reaching their recipients today, chances are you've been blacklisted.