On May 1, 1997, AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) was released

The closed door sound when a crush left the chat was heartbreaking.

Be me circa 1997 Get home from school Login to AOL *Modem Sounds* for like 20 seconds “Welcome!” “You Got Mail!” Get IM from hot girl at school *oh shit oh shit oh shit* Start chatting back and forth *Think this is going somewhere* Tells me her cousin likes me and wants me to ask her out Me: 😑 Her cousin looks like Jabba The Hutt Say I’m pretty busy and end conversation

The original dating app lol.

It was always depressing to hear that “door close” sound when you were hoping to get that message back

@jhawk4life You would always get those CDs Im the mail for free hours of AOL

It was a wild time… anyone else join random chat rooms and make pen pals?

Children today (including young adults) Wouldn’t have been able to survive that era. I miss my 90’s and early 2,000s.

Finding cool song lyrics to put as your away status.

I loved all the messengers back in the day, only to go invisible because I didn't want to be contacted😆

@doinggood9

Yahoo! Messenger, MSN, and AOL. Damn I just time traveled…

I was just texting an old College buddy about how much I would love to see those old chat logs…

True story: I had never used the internet before, and someone asked me to set up their AOL. I popped the CD in and kept clicking “Next” until I reached a step where I needed to enter the internet provider number. I had no idea what that was, so I just entered the first phone number I remembered my friend’s house. Then I kept clicking “Next” until the setup was done. Time to connect to the internet… and of course, the modem dialed my friend’s house. We could hear his mom through the computer: “Hello? Hello? Who’s this?” My friend rushed to the phone, picked it up, and asked, “Is this the internet?” Months later, I was hanging out with the other friend, and he told me a weird story about someone calling his house asking if it was the internet. I never told him it was me lol.

ocookie23 🍪 those were the days

@ShaunoftheSmith Me as a 12 year old in the chat rooms: Funkychick91: A/S/L? 😂

People after this era can never fathom the anger and rage of when someone in the house picked up the phone and dropped you from being online. Especially if you were 20 minutes in of a download and finally about to see Pamela Anderson’s boobs. Not me, but from what I heard 🤷‍♂️

We used to rush home to sign on. Now we rush home to see our kids.

Real ones know this was the mvp

what was your un?

I'm old enough to have used ICQ

Can still hear the door opening and closing

This doesn’t look that much different than @tZERO platform.

We had so much fun with this back then.

I never had AOL. Just a seemingly endless supply of their cd's.

Anyone else prefer MSN Messenger over AOL?

AIM for IRL friends. Yahoo Messenger or ICQ for anons.

Today’s status: I get knocked down But I get up again You’re never gonna keep me down

My AOL username was also @fulldecent rt if you haven't changed usernames since AOL

I was 14 and honestl preferred ICQ. Uh oh!

@island_tro80622 My first program that I ever made was a punter for the chat rooms and then punt blockers 😂

@KFCBarstool How did I learn today that the day I was born, AIM came out?

I was an original AOL teenager and I preferred logins in to aol rather than using just messenger

I just remember being in chat rooms I had no business being in. What a time! 😂

That noise when someone logged online 🙌🏻

@T_DaVillain I can still hear a mf coming in and leaving now. The nostalgia to my ears. I miss youuuuuu