I’m 25 and have had my AOL email since before I was born, set up by my parents. In the late 90’s and early 00’s every now and then they would send a few photos to it perhaps with an accompanying story of anything that they’d want me to remember. I then used it as my main email and have continued to till this day.
During a job interview today I was told I was great fit but they weren’t sure about my email address!
Apparently they can tell a lot about a person just from the fact they have an AOL email address in 2023.
Has anyone else had something similar, is it actually a big deal?
I too got my kids gmail accounts for when they are older. Normal usernames they won’t be embarrassed to use in college or employers. But if Gmail stops being the best/normal option, then I would suggest they update, I’ll get them a normal account when it launches and give it to them when they are done with the goofy middle school username they created.
I too look at people with AOL or Hotmail and laugh. Or people who use their Comcast or AT&T account email.😂
You couldn’t even get into GMail without an invite until part way into 2007…so no, that’s at best 16 years.
That’s why I have an AOL address, that was one of the most promising free providers when I was applying to colleges around 2006 that wasn’t tied to some particular ISP (which my parents were frequently changing because it was more cost-effective for dialup…which was what they had until fiber came in around 2008)
Yahoo started in 1997, and everyone was using it by 2001.
Nobody has been using their ISP email since AOL tried that in the 90’s, especially not in 2008 like you claim. The statistics prove that incorrect, in 2006 Gmail already had 50% of the users as AOL was failing.
AOL and Hotmail are now commonly used for junk spam when a salesman asks for an email. If somebody gave me AOL or Hotmail I would consider blowing me off to a spam account.