The service traces its history to an online service known as PlayNET. By , AOL had about three million active users. AOL shrank rapidly thereafter, partly due to the decline of dial-up and rise of broadband. Under his leadership, the company invested in media brands and advertising technologies. Its sole product was an online service called GameLine for the Atari video game console, after von Meister's idea of buying music on demand was rejected by Warner Bros. In January , Steve Case was hired as a marketing consultant for Control Video on the recommendation of his brother, investment banker Dan Case.
In May , Jim Kimsey became a manufacturing consultant for Control Video, which was near bankruptcy. Kimsey was brought in by his West Point friend Frank Caufield , an investor in the company. On May 24, , Quantum Computer Services , an online services company, was founded by Kimsey from the remnants of Control Video, with Kimsey as chief executive officer and Marc Seriff as chief technology officer.
In , Case was promoted again to executive vice-president. Kimsey soon began to groom Case to take over the role of CEO, which he did when Kimsey retired in Kimsey changed the company's strategy, and in , launched a dedicated online service for Commodore 64 and computers, originally called Quantum Link "Q-Link" for short.
The service was different from other online services as it used the computing power of the Commodore 64 and the Apple II rather than just a "dumb" terminal. It passed tokens back and forth and provided a fixed-price service tailored for home users. After the company parted ways with Apple in October , Quantum changed the service's name to America Online. From the beginning, AOL included online games in its mix of products; many classic and casual games were included in the original PlayNet software system.
The company introduced many innovative online interactive titles and games, including:. This also coincided with a new "carpet bombing" marketing campaign by CMO Jan Brandt to distribute as many free trial AOL trial disks as possible through nonconventional distribution partners. AOL offered the first real-time homework help service the Teacher Pagerβ; prior to this, AOL provided homework help bulletin boards , the first service by children, for children Kids Only Online, , the first online service for parents the Parents Information Network, , the first online courses , the first omnibus service for teachers the Teachers' Information Network, , the first online exhibit Library of Congress , , the first parental controls, and many other online education firsts.
