AOL discontinues LISTSERV mailing list service

03.11.2011
Ending a service it has offered for well over a decade, AOL is shutting down its free LISTSERV-based mailing-list hosting operations, the company told mailing list administrators.

"If your list is still actively used, please make arrangements to find another service prior to the shutdown date and notify your list members of the transition details," an email notice . "If you are no longer actively using this service then no other action is required."

AOL had first planned to shutter the service on Nov. 1, but pushed back the date by a month. AOL did not immediately return calls for comment.

For those still actively running AOL mailing lists, mailing-list service provider L-Soft is , though at a nominal cost (starting at US$8 per month).

At the peak of the service's popularity in the late 1990s, AOL was the third-largest provider of mailing lists, , serving more than a million users. To offer the service, AOL used the most widely used mailing-list management software, LISTSERV, in 1986. Thomas later went on to found L-Soft, and now serves as CEO for the company.

Along with IRC (Internet Relay Chat) and USENET newsgroups, mailing lists can be considered among the first of the Internet's social media platforms. The mailing list served as a simple tool to blast out alerts or notifications by email. In addition to this duty, however, mailing lists also played an important role in connecting people in remote locations who bonded----over a common topic.