The Official Alt.AOL FAQ

(Frequently Asked Questions)

1) What is the address of AOL's POP, IMAP, or SMTP Server?

AOL does not use standard Internet protocols, so there are no addresses. You may be able to subscribe to an outside service that does support these protocols, to find these just go to any major search engine such as Yahoo and type in something along the lines of 'Free Email'

2) I just got an awesome news reader, now how do I make it work with AOL's server?

You don't. Again, AOL does not support standard protocols. You may however be able to find an open server, although these are normally unreliable at best and just don't work at their worst. So your two best options are to out source for a fee to a service like SuperNews or Deja, or get another ISP that has its own news feed

3) The images that I see on the web look like crap.. how do I fix this?

This is due to AOL's implementation of compressed images or ART. Basically it takes shrinks the image by reducing it's resolution and making it look like crap. To fix this you need to find preferences in AOL 4.0 this is located under the button 'My AOL'. Once in this menu you need to find WWW Preferences and click on that, this should bring up yet another menu (get used to this, it is quite common on AOL) On that you will want to click on the last tab to get to the 'Web Graphics' menu. Make sure that the box is unchecked. You will then want to go back to the first tab labeled 'General' and down to the box 'Temporary Internet Files' hit the delete button to clear your web cache or you will not notice the difference in pages that you have visited before. Now hit the 'Apply' button down at the bottom and close out the windows. Please note that this may slow down your web browsing considerably, but you will be able to enjoy pictures much more.

4) Is there any way to set up an auto-responder or automatically forward my mail to a different account?

Nope. Again, one of the things that the rest of the Internet takes for granted AOL lacks.

5) Why does everyone always answer every question with 'AOL is Sucks' and/or 'Get a REAL ISP'?

Humm... now why would everyone say that AOL sucks? Could it be because it is true? Nahhh.. Ok let me put it this way. Although AOL does have it's good points, for the most part they are severely lagging behind in terms of technology. There are mail and news programs out there that are free and do at least 5 times as much as AOL could ever do with its current mailer or news reader. And at the time of this writing, AOL has just implemented a 'kill file' on its news reader, but only in some areas. This is something that the rest of us have enjoyed for many years. There are *many* other reasons, far to many to cover in a simple FAQ for sure. If you would like to learn more then please visit the links at the bottom of this page.

6) Everyone just flamed my arse to a crisp.. why?

Well did you do any one of the following things? Say anything akin to 'AOL RULES', 'You all Suck!' ? Did you ask a question without reading this FAQ first? Are you bitching about people not liking AOL? If you did any of the above things then you deserve everything coming to you and then some.. so quit your whining and just get the hell out before we have Wurk TOS your sorry arse.

7) Shouldn't AOL bashing be confined to alt.aol-sucks?

Well that is kind of a reasonable point. But since we have no charter and this is the first FAQ written for the group that I know of... My point: The name of the group implies that it is open for discussion about AOL in general, and not limited to AOL help, or positive comments about AOL or even just negative comments about AOL. True if you *just* want to bash AOL then a.a-s would be the more appropriate group for it, but if you feel like debating the merits of AOL, or dispensing the occasional advice to the AOL newbie then alt.aol covers that as well.

8) What should I do to get my feet wet the first time? - for first time posters.

LURK! Trust me.. you will be a much happier person if you do this. Just linger around for a bit and watch the goings on in the group. It gives you the chance to see what the accepted norm is, and if you are coming to ask a question it may be answered before you ever have to ask it. This is really a good rule of thumb for any group that you are new to... that way you get a feel for who the regulars are.. who the trolls are... etc. So again.. this is something that I can't stress enough.. LURK. Also, by actually reading this FAQ you have made an Important step in the right direction.

9) Is this a good group to get tech help in?

Well, yes and no. If it is something that hasn't been asked a billion times and is not answered in the FAQ then I would say you have a pretty good shot of actually getting a good working answer. Just hope you read this before you asked about those mail servers... But according to Princess Violet you best bet for getting around the clock help with AOL and without running as high a risk of getting flamed is at Keyword: MHM or in the internal AOL group: aol.newsgroups.help . Of course there is always AOL's tech support line (HAHAHAHA).

10) How do I avoid getting spammed when posting to news groups?

Unfortunately there is no fool proof method. The best advice I can offer is to mung your address. Another thing that helps is to get a web based account (I suggest putting in uhh not so accurate information when filling out the account) and use that as a spam trap. To mung your address on AOL you will need to find the options button on the window at Keyword: Newsgroups. From there you will need to find the field that is labeled 'Spam Block' or something similar. This will add the text you input to the end of your address. So instead of being xxxxx@aol.com it will appear as xxxxx@aol.comNOSPAM or something similar. There are a few possible drawbacks to this, one is that you may not be able to post to moderated groups using a munged address. Another way of dealing with spam is to set up mail controls to block all mail that comes to the name you use to post, or only allow certain people to mail you. This can be accomplished by going to KW: Mail Controls. To deal with the problem of people not being able to mail you I would suggest putting something like this in your sig line: xxxxxATaolDOTcom. That solves the problem of spammers being able to harvest the address but lets people know what address they can mail you at.

11) I am getting spam up the wazoo, how can I stop it and if I just scrap this address altogether, how can I avoid it next time?

If you are on AOL and asking this I will be *very* surprised. Most AOL users I have talked to this about don't see spam as a problem. Unfortunately it really is a problem, and for several reasons. Not the least of which being that every single piece of spam costs your provider money.. they in turn pass the cost on to you. So lets just for one second assume that AOL did not have to deal with all the spam and filtering devices that they have right now. I would estimate that their cost would drop by a very large amount. So rather than you paying $22 a month, it would be something more akin to $18 a month, possibly even lower. There are several tools that AOL does not give their members that would likely help. The first would be to allow the use of Nicks in their chat rooms. The current system ties your AOL address to your chat address. Obviously it would be a little confusing at first, but chat seems to be the place where most addresses are harvested. However, it seems as though AOL has made some major improvements such as the aforementioned munging ability for usenet, and apparently they have implemented timers for chat rooms. So these it seems have cut down on the amount of harvesting on AOL, but spammers tend to be clever, so IMHO it will not be too long before they figure out haw to get around these restrictions. For more info please follow the links at the bottom of this page.

12) Hey have you heard (insert lame joke or use for bisk here)?

YES!!! We have heard them all about 100,000,000 times. Please don't post it again. If you come up with something funny and original then go ahead and post it... what we are referring to are the things that have been on the web for the last 5 years. They are old and tired... most of the time the web site hasn't been updated in years and the jokes are just about as stale. So no uses for bisks.. no lame jokes... nothing.. they are all OLD and can easily be found on the web.

13) I have heard that there is a way to read my AOL mail with a special program that integrates with Outlook. Is this true?

I have it, or I should say that AFAIK I have it. But I refuse to use it or even try and run it. I personally see it as too much of a security risk. But if you really think that you must have it I would be happy to send it to you free of charge. I would also suggest that you run every virus scanner you can get your hands on if you decide to open it. From what I hear there is another possible answer, apparently some company has developed a program that will do almost the same thing. I can't however vouch for this company nor do I use them myself. My advice is to approach any program that asks for your AOL password with *extreme* caution. To mail me please follow the link at the bottom of this page.

Update: Netscape 6 Beta release has added native support for AOL mail... I don't know how it works, or even if it works... but if you'd like to try it, head over to http://netscape.com and check it out.

14) Hey I have this cool file I want to share with everyone. Can I post it here? & How do I post binaries from AOL?

First things first... this is NOT a binaries group. So do NOT post pictures, sounds or any other type of file. Please post in plain text only. If you have a file that you must share with everyone then put it up on a web site.. it will take you two extra seconds and will save you the grief of being flamed to a crisp. As for sending binary files from AOL.. well it sucks but it can be done. You will first need to encode the file using an external encoder. Make sure you have it output as a text file, and then you will need to manually copy and paste into the posting window. I told you it sucked :( Your best chance of getting a binary encoder would be at keyword: MIME. And remember, only post them in groups where binary files are acceptable. If you are unsure then *ASK*.

15) You mentioned some links??

Why yes, yes I did didn't I? Well here they are, categorized in no particular order:

Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email
Adam's Unofficial AOL Mail FAQ - A much more comprehensive look into AOL's mail... a good read.