AOL IM Junkie

Like a drug addict my usage started small. An IM here, an IM there. I thought IMing was a fun novelty that I could stop using any time I wanted. Friends asked me, "What's your IM? I've got something to show you." In return for my IM username I'd receive a link to a funny video of a cat on a treadmill, a kid trying to launch a bottle rocket from his butt crack, or a dancing banana singing about peanut butter jelly time.

Before I knew what had happened I had over 50 people on my buddy list. Coworkers were IMing me on a regular basis to ask important questions like, "Can you update this PDF," "What's the PMS color of the company logo," or "Have you seen this great video of a cat on a treadmill?"

IM had become an important communication tool in my personal and professional life, which is why this morning was so traumatic.

After launching iChat I was greeted with the message, "Could not connect to AIM. Try Again. The server message was Auth: Db SendError." I've never seen this message before so tried logging in a few more times. None of my coworkers were having similar problems, and I was able to log into an old unused IM account. Even the AOL website gave me a login error message, "The service you are trying to reach is temporarily unavailable. Please try again later."

"Temporarily unavailable"? What does that even mean? Only my account is unavailable? Was it something I did? Something I said?

Visting the Customer Service section of the AOL website I discovered that I couldn't telephone, email or use Live Chat because I'm not a paying member. Clicking on Live Chat was a fun experience. A new small window popped open with a message that read, "Click to Launch Live Chat." Clicking that button popped open another browser window with the original Customer Service homepage. Nice little loop they have set up.

I was getting frustrated.

After some panicked clicking around the AOL website, I stumbled upon a separate help section for AOL IM, which consisted of about 10 questions and answers. None of which addressed my issue. My last ditch effort was to click the "Forgot my password" link, even though I hadn't forgotten, to see if that would do anything. I never received the promised password email, but I could now log into my account.

All was right with the world.

But this got me thinking about how dependent we can become on not just technology, but proprietary technology. AOL is the IM de-facto standard in the good old US of A. What if AOL goes out of business? What if AOL decides to close the AOL IM system to programs like iChat? What if AOL decides that anyone who lives in Massachusetts doesn't deserve to use the AOL service?

Does it seem fair that AOL offer no option for customer service to free AOL IM users? Why not offer a paid customer service option. I'd gladly have paid $2 to have a live chat session. Anything to restore my dependancy on instant messaging.

Speaking of which, I have to go watch a video about some skate boarding kid landing crotch first on a handrail.