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An online service provider, in modern usage refers to an entity which provides a service online. It can include internet service providers and web sites, such as Wikipedia's or Usenet (commonly accessed through Google Groups). In its original more limited definition it referred only to a commercial computer communication service in which paid members could dial via a computer modem the service's private computer network and access various services and information resources such a bulletin boards, downloadable files and programs, news articles, chat rooms, and electronic mail services. The term "online service" was also used in references to these dial-up services. The traditional dial-up online service differed from the modern Internet service provider in that they provided a large degree of content that was only accessible by those who subscribed to the online service, while ISP mostly serves to provide access to the internet and generally provides little if any exclusive content of its own. In the U.S., the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA) portion of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act has expanded the legal definition of online service in two different ways for different portions of the law. It states:
An *(A) As used in subsection (a), the term service provider means an entity offering the transmission, routing, or providing of connections for digital online communications, between or among points specified by a user, of material of the user's choosing, without modification to the content of the material as sent or received.
- (B) As used in this section, other than subsection (a), the term service provider means a provider of online services or network access, or the operator of facilities therefor, and includes an entity described in subparagraph (A).
History
The first commercial online services came about in the early 1980’s. Compuserve (owned by H&R Block) and The SOURCE (owned by The Reader's Digest) are considered the first major online services created to serve the market of personal computer users. Utilizing a text-based interface, these services allowed anyone with a modem and communications software to use email, chat, news, financial and stock information, bulletin boards, special interest groups (SIGs), forums and general information. Subscribers could exchange email only with other subscribers of the same service. Other text-based online services followed such as Delphi online service, GEnie and MCI Mail. The 1980's also saw the rise of independent Computer Bulletin Boards (BBS).
The commercial services used pre-existing packet-switched (X.25) data communications networks; users dialed into local access points and were connected to remote computer centers where information and services were located. As with telephone service, subscribers paid by the minute, at day-time and evening/weekend rates.
As the use of computers that supported color and graphics (GUI or a graphical user interface) increased, such the Atarti, Commodore, Texas Instruments' TI99-4a, Apple //e and early Microsoft-based PCs, online services gradually began delivering information that could be displayed graphically. Early services such as CompuServe and The Source added graphics-based programs to present their information. Early versions provided a simplistic GUI, though they continued to offer text-based access for those who needed or wanted it. In the mid-1980's graphics-only online services such as Prodigy, MSN, and America Online) sprang up. These application programs presaged the web browser that would change global online life 10 years later. Apple computer developed its own service, called AppleLink, which was targeted mostly at Apple dealers, developers, and Mac computer consultants. Later, Apple offered the short lived E-World, targeted at Mac consumers.
Starting in the early 1990’s, the internet, which had previously been limited to government, academic, and corporate research settings gradually opened up to the general public. The invention of the world-wide-web in 1993 accelerated the development of the internet as an information and communication resource for consumers and businesses. The sudden availability of low- to no-cost email and appearance of free independent web sites broke the business model that had supported the rise of the early online services industry.
Compuserve, AOL, and Prodigy began adding access to internet e-mail, to Usenet newsgroups, to ftp access, and to web sites. At the same time, they were forced to drop their usage-based billing structure and move to monthly subscriptions. Similarly, companies that paid to have AOL host their information or early online stores began to develop their own web sites, putting further stress on the economics of the online industry. Services like AOL (which later acquired CompuServe) were able to make the transition to the Internet-centric online -- now Web -- world. Others were not.
A new class of online service provider appeared to provide access to the Internet, the internet service provider or ISP. As the internet became popular, many ISP’s began offering flat-fee, unlimited access plans. These providers first offered access through telephone and modem access, just as did the early online services provides. This method has gradually been supplanted by high speed and broadband access through cable and phone companies.
The importance of the online services industry is hard to overstate, though it is often overlooked when the "history of the Internet" is discussed. For instance: when Mosaic and then Netscape were released in 1994, they had a beta test population of more than 10 million people in all walks of life, in business and education, far beyond the famous "early adopters," and they were located all over the world. This brief period demonstrated the unprecedented power of personal information networking that continues to flower along the World Wide Web.
Online service Interfaces
The first online service utilized a simple text based interface in which content was largely text only and users made choices via a command prompt. This allowed just about any computer with a modem and terminal communications program the ability to access these text-based online services. Compuserve would later offer, with the advent of the Apple Macintosh and MS Windows-based PC’s, a GUI interface program for their service. This provided a very rudimentary GUI interface. Compuserve continued to offer text only access for those needing it. Online services like Prodigy and AOL developed their online service around a GUI and thus unlike CompuServe's early GUI-based software, these online services provided a more robust GUi interface. Early GUI-based online service interfaces offered little in the way of detailed graphics such as photographs or pictures. Largely they where limited to simple icons and buttons and text. As modem speeds increased it became more feasible to offer images and other more complicated graphics to users thus providing a nicer look to their services.
Common resources provided by online services
Some of the resources and services online services have provided access to include message boards, chat services, electronic mail between members and sometimes other online services, file download services, current news and weather, online encyclopedia, airline reservations, and text-based online games. Major online service providers like Compuserve also served as a way for software and hardware manufacturers to provide online support for their products via forums and file download areas within the online service provider's network. Prior to the invention of the world-wide-web, such support either had to be done via a private Bulletin board system run by the company or via online services or both.
See also: Online service provider law
"Online service provider"