Yes. I worked for the world's largest ISPs (NETCOM (#1), which merged with Mindspring (which was considered #2), which merged with EarthLink (the previous #3, then #2 to the post-NETCOM Mindspring). It was funny, in hindsight, that even though AOL had already adopted TCP/IP and integrated an "Internet Gateway" functionality and had more subscribers than even the combined #1, 2, and 3 rollup I just described, at no time did anyone in the industry actually consider AOL to be an ISP, so the "#1" in size distinction went to the companies mentioned. AOL, deserved or not, never really escaped their second class designation, which also tended to taint their users as they ventured on to the larger internet.

All that said, I still communicate with one person who maintains their aol.com email address to this day in spite of it all.

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serf 7 hours ago | parent [-]

Mindspring, I haven't read that in a long time.

Didn't they try to come back as a brand when free ad-supported dialups became a thing for a bit?

	▲	ycombiredd 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I dunno. I left around 1999, just before the EarthLink merger. Related, while doing a quick search to see if I could learn anything about what you described I found Wikipedia quoting NYT as writing about EarthLink in 2000: "second largest Internet service provider after America Online". I guess it was around y2k when aol finally got its ISP (and this its "world's largest") designation by the world at large. :)