Online Services

VIENNA, Va. -- America Online Inc., a provider of computer data-base services, Tuesday announced price cuts of as much as 60 percent, sending its stock reeling.The company, the nation's third-largest provider of online services, said it would provide access to all of its services for up to five hours a month for $9.95. The new rate, effective May 1, replaces the current charge of $7.95 for up to two hours of use, and $6 for each additional hour, or a total of $24.95 for five hours.The company said it expects 90 percent of its subscribers will not use its services more than five hours a month.

A year after Apple Computer Inc. launched its iTunes Music Service, the online music industry is selling songs by the millions - and that may not bode well for the major record labels. Online services account for a fraction of overall music sales, but they're growing rapidly. And the new choices they give consumers threaten to remix the recording industry's traditional revenue streams, pumping up the volume of singles and subscriptions and turning down album sales. Customers at three of the leading online services - iTunes, Musicmatch Inc.'s Musicmatch Downloads and RealNetworks Inc.'s Rhapsody - buy about 10 times as many singles as they do albums.

As the worst urban rioting since the 1960s unfolded in Los Angeles, subscribers to the nation's online services pitched in with eyewitness accounts, local news updates and tips on which neighborhoods to avoid -- and which routes to take to safety.Like other online services, GEnie, which has about 300,000 subscribers nationwide, set up an electronic bulletin board Wednesday when the Rodney King verdict was returned. The bulletin board, which allows any subscribers to swap messages with other subscribers, has been swamped ever since, said Laura Staley, product manager for Rockville-based GEnie.

PALO ALTO, Calif. - A little over a year ago, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and America Online Inc. heralded a new Internet service geared toward customers of the world's biggest retailer, and rural shoppers in particular. The co-branded service would bridge the "digital divide" that had kept many rural Americans offline, the companies said. It would offer dial-up numbers in towns that had none, and be priced for the "value-conscious." The announcement was made Dec. 16, 1999. Wal-Mart shoppers are still waiting for the service.

The Harford County Department of Inspections, Licenses and Permits, or DILP, working in cooperation with the Department of Information Systems, has made technology enhancements that will now allow DILP to migrate from traditional file storage to electronic storage of construction documents. Because of limited file storage space, DILP's practice had been to discard a large percentage of submitted documents after 180 days from the issuance of the Certificate of Occupancy. The new electronic storage retrieval system will alleviate the need for maintain paper or "hard" copies of approved plans and will assist DILP inspectors in accessing documents while in the field on assignments.

America Online's stock slumped last week after the company's latest warning that other online services and direct Internet access providers could spell tougher competition in the future. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, AOL reiterated comments it made to analysts last quarter, warning of potentially high "churn" rates -- the rate at which new customers join and leave the service -- lower subscriber rates and higher expenses. Indeed, the company announced plans to spend more than $100 million in a new marketing campaign targeted at computer owners who are not current AOL members.

Thousands of electronic data bases, or information collections, are available for professionals in every industry who must track competition, monitor international economies and keep abreast of business trends.These burgeoning information services are at your fingertips if you have a computer and a modem.According to "Business Online," a book by Jean Scanlan, Ulla de Stricker and Anne Conway Fernald (John Wiley & Sons, 1989), the cost of using an online service usually depends on how much time is spent online and how much data is extracted.

The recording industry's legal assault has floored Napster Inc., once the king of the Internet's song-swapping services. Now the major record labels are gearing up for Round 2, as the fight moves to the marketplace. Within the next few months, Net powerhouses America Online, Yahoo, MSN and RealNetworks are expected to launch subscription music services that are either backed or owned by the labels. But they face a monumental challenge: persuading consumers to pay for something they can still get for free.

When Apple opened its online iTunes Music Store last month with 200,000 digital album tracks for sale at 99 cents each, the company said it expected to sell a million songs in its first month. Instead, customers downloaded a million tunes in the first week. That's an astounding figure, considering that Macs with the latest version of Apple's operating system - the only computers that can access the store - account for less than 1 percent of the nation's PCs. If I owned stock in a record company, I'd look at those numbers and wonder why the bozos at the top have spent so much energy over the past three years fighting online music instead of jumping in to sell it in a format that millions prefer.

The recording industry's legal assault has floored Napster Inc., once the king of the Internet's song-swapping services. Now the major record companies are taking the fight to the marketplace. Within the next few months, Net powerhouses America Online, Yahoo, MSN and RealNetworks are expected to launch subscription music services that are either backed or owned by the labels. But they face a monumental challenge: persuading consumers to pay for something they can still get for free. Despite Napster's doldrums, services such as MusicCity.