Another Internet Freebie Weakening

Juno was the first thing that truly caught my affection at the beginning of my entry into the internet world.
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We interrupt this blog to warn you that most of this will be tedious details describing the Juno email program. If too much for you, it is my blog now, isn't it ?
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Back then, not many people even had their own computers. And I then could not justify spending what felt like large sums of money to get an ISP. But Juno (back then) was different. It was not an ISP, and best of all it was free. Juno was an email program. You had your own email address (such as myname@juno.com). The program would flash a banner ad or two, while running (the only real "cost" to you) and you could type away and create your emails. When you were ready to send them, you would hit a button and the program would then dial up, connect to the net, send your messages, pick up any new messages, and then disconnect. You could view any new emails at your leisure off line. It was a pretty slick program for free, and was fairly practical as it did not stay connected for long spans of time. It was text only and virus free. It did not give you internet access to view web sites.

As time marched on, people with the Juno service (by the way at www.juno.com) also could receive ten hours of free internet access (with a banner type ad) with their email service. The maximum server limits for email gradually shrunk all the way down to 2 mb. Still, I guess, free is free (of course they do offer more with a paid service, but my topic today is the free service).

Effective this month, Juno users may only use the Juno email program that runs off line if they pay for the service. They can read their emails now only through web-mail on the net for free, but with only 10 hours a month, that leaves you only 20 minutes a day average to write and read on line email any surfing time is also part of the twenty minutes. Geeze, If I get a long email, or interrupted, it could take me most of that just to read ONE email.

So use of only free Juno services, just isn't what it used to be. Another quality free service is gone, or rather weakened to the point of seeming impotent.