rs0212

I still pay $4.95 a month for CompuServe (an AOL subsidy) to keep my eMail address, and I'm sure there are plenty of others out there who do as well. Put it this way, you have to pay to use the AOL software and they keep it updated and it's actually not bad to have a browser, email, and file download manager in one. The last "true" CompuServe software was version 7.0 released in 2001, and wasn't compatible with any OS after Windows XP. And there's enough of us paying CompuServe users for AOL to have put in effort to rebrand the AOL software for CompuServe users with the name "CompuServe Desktop Gold," the CS logo, CS specific icons, and the blue color scheme in 2019. Now that branding might not seem like a big deal, but for a publicly traded company to put any amount of time into updating software for the first time in 18 years, I would imagine there are a significant amount of us paying users to justify that. And that's just CompuServe, a minute amount of users compared to the greater AOL base. 

I know basically every other email (including AOL) is free now, but I've had my email address since my dad signed a 3 year contract with CompuServe back when I was in high school in order to get a subsidized computer, and so many people have my @cs.com email address, it would be impossible to give everyone I know a new email address.

Plus, like I said, there's quite a few people in rural areas who still require dial-up.