You've Got 5.0!

By JOSHUA QUITTNER

America Onliners, rejoice! With last week's release of Version 5.0--the latest upgrade of AOL's popular operating software--you can do what everyone else on the Net has long been doing: automatically append a "signature file" to outgoing e-mail. Think of sig files as the bumper stickers of e-mail--your chance to personalize your messages. While mine has always been simply name, rank and fax number, the best sig quote I ever saw was the whimsical "I'd like to die in my sleep with a smile on my face like my granddad, rather than screaming in terror like his passengers."

Some people might point out that the ability to do signature files is but the smallest part of AOL's latest software upgrade, and I suppose they're right. But it is the little things--giving people what they want--that have made America Online the world's most popular Internet-service provider. The company launched 10 years ago last week; today AOL reaches 18 million households, making it more populated than the city of Shanghai. The company claims its users are its best test bed for new ideas--that's where many of the features in 5.0 originated.

Where formerly, for example, you could create only five user names per account, now you can have up to seven. With 5.0, you can also create longer screen names (up to 16 alphanumeric characters), which means, of course, that there will be a scramble to sign up full names, like anitahamilton. (I opted for the hackerish unusablesignal--homage to the error message that the television in my office has displayed ever since I ripped the cable out of it and plugged it into my PC.) Another good thing: you can customize your welcome screen with a list of sites you most often visit. Also, users can now retrieve deleted e-mail up to 24 hours after the time of trashing--a dubious move that's certain to increase the divorce rate.

Perhaps the biggest new feature in 5.0 is "You've Got Pictures," a collaboration with Kodak. AOL users can now drop off their 35-mm or APS film at any of the 38,000 participating Kodak service centers in the U.S. After specifying that you want the service, you pick up your paper prints the way you normally would, only now they'll also be digitized and delivered directly to your AOL account. You can then create a "Buddy Gallery," which permits people on your Buddy Lists to view the snapshots. You or your buddies can download those snapshots to your computer and print them. Or you can order prints online from Kodak.

AOL also unveiled its new "My Calendar" feature, which permits users to keep their datebooks online. The idea is that you won't ever have to be worried about forgetting your datebook at work (or wherever) since it will always be available to you on AOL 's servers. This might work for you, but I don't like Net-based calendars. Computers have revolutionized the way we do just about everything, but I've yet to see an improvement over the pencil-and-paper platform for schedules--it simply takes too long to input stuff on PCs. After all the connecting, pointing and clicking, the waiting is simply a deal killer as far as I'm concerned. My Calendar is no exception.

AOL has laid out a number of features it plans to add during the upcoming year. The best: you call a special phone number, and a robotic voice will read you your e-mail. Imagine all the wry sig files you'll soon be hearing.

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