After 34 long and (mostly) fruitful years, AOL is finally shutting down its dial-up internet service. And while this could leave some users in parts of rural America struggling to connect to the internet, the end of AOL's dial-up service is probably well overdue.

A Dial-Up Explainer for Younger Readers...

For the uninitiated (likely, anyone under the age of around 25), dial-up meant that you literally had to tap into your landline to access the internet. And speeds were so slow that web pages took a while to load, and images used to appear gradually from top to bottom.

Through the 1990s, dial-up was all we had, and millions of people used AOL's internet service to get online thanks to the free CDs that were given away in everything from magazines to cereal boxes.

AOL Is Shutting Down I

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