I think if they were really smart, they would’ve gone with something non-slick at first, something with a craig’s list style interface (but better organization obviously), and clearly prepopulated with your AIM buddies. Then they can add, add, add features as they figure out who their users are. As it is, they’re predefining their users as the exact same people as MySpace, TagWorld, et al, which seems to be a “me too” play. In any case, there are still millions of people who use AIM and either don’t use or don’t like MySpace, so AOL has a big chance here.

Yuck. This is freaking horrible.

The user experience is nonsensical. There is a time and place for Ajax. Publish my page? I want to make small fast changes. I do not want to spend an hour editing my page to find out AOL screwed up, I got timed out and lost all of my changes. Also, it feels like I am going from one website to another when I navigate to their community features or to check my email. There is no feeling of continuity.

Why would they require users to create AIMPages? They should default an AIMPage to every AIM user.

Beta? No need to append “beta” to your logo. The product does a great job communicating the message. I hate being mean, but I expect more from AOL. The 1,300 layoffs were obviously not in the right departments.

It’s broken for me - delivering Apache errors when I try to sign up.

It crashes on both Safari and Firefox..and looks ugly. I’d rather use Opera Community than that.

Why does it work so slowly? Can’t AOL afford faster servers?

I predict DOA

Why does it matter that they are affiliated with AOL? You give better reviews to big companies?

Watch what happens when AOL goes after MySpace where they cannot compete…safety and trust. Parents who dont want their kids on MySpace may see AIM pages as a decent alternative for thier teenages, and thats where AOL has won in the past. Trusted brand for families. If they are smart they will also tap into all the related TW brands and content that this market related to…ie teen people and people magazine, the WB etc. I would not dismiss this based on technical features…

Worked OK for me (FF 1.5.0.3, WinXP SP2) in loading and putting a couple of modules down. Agree that it’s slow and painful, and with not a lot of automated content, yet.

People’ll stick with MySpace until they get at least the Early Adopters online, and this product’s slowness and lack of bits to add is a serious impediment to that end. The latter is easily fixed; the former is, hopefully, not a result of poor design implementation.

It is all about the integration in the AIM client. If they do a good job with that then this is going to be a very BIG deal.

HELP!

it doesnt work with .mac aim accounts :’(

The “build more stuff” strategy they took to tackle MySpace is such a classic example of how not to compete. I guess that is the natural thing to do when you are sitting on boatloads of money. [Warning: shameless self promotion beings here] At BubbleShare, we didn’t have the luxury of “outdoing with more stuff” — but instead, focused on “less is more” and finding so called “uncontested space” where we could create interesting innovations. [end]

AOL should have focused on creating new ways to create real time social network experiences with their AIM client rather than try to compete head on with “more stuff.”

They looked at MySpace and tried to “do more with more” — instead what they could have done is do more with less, being more clean cut, less focus on ease of use rather than creating more features.

I don’t run the native AOL client, but from everything that I’ve seen, there seems to be little in the way of leveraging the real time client side app other than just using it as a bootstrap to get the social network going.

On the flip side, I agree with Narendra, they own AIM, if they can evolve the service well and create innovative cross over features that take advantage of that client that has a massive user base, they are truly in a position to have a shot at taking on the king of the hill (myspace).

But until AOL truly decides to think outside the box and really innovate, they’ve got a real up hill battle.

In case anyone is interested, here’s more of my ranting here:
http://simplyalbert.blogspot.c.....esaim.html

It should work fine in Firefox 1.5. We’ll be adding support for more/older browsers in the very near future. It’s a first beta, and there’s still a lot to do…

I think some of the comments here came from not actually having visited the site. It all worked fine for me in Firefox. It was pre-populated with my buddies. It was slow when I tried IE, but then, hey, its IE.

rubbish…

The redirects freak out in an endless loop if you have cookies turned off.

People… do we not understand what the word “beta” means? Give it time… even if it is an AOL product. It has the potential.

does anyone know if they have RSS/ATOM feeds for content on the site such as blogs and pictures? I was trying to find something but to no avail.

It seems to be overlooked that not only is it a modular design, but you can create your own modules. http://www.iamalpha.com

So if you find something missing from your page, you can make it yourself. You don’t like one of the modules, roll your own.

Maotaz, there is an RSS feed module named Kevin-rss under the under construction category. There is also a Flickr module and an AOL pictures module. They work quite well……

This is a horrific example of what NOT TO DO when developing a web application. MySpace works because it is quick, easy and manageable. This thing has every trick in the AJAX book and it doesn’t even work in Safari. What the hell was AOL thinking? Apparently they still have not fired the product manager who aquired Netscape but kept the browser deal with Microsoft.

Clowns.

You guys are being harsh just because it’s AOL! I will be happy to get away from those ugly CSS designs, emo/punk music, and 12 year olds who think posting a pic of themselves flipping the bird is cool. This very well could turn into that though, since it is full AOL users. At least for now it’s clean. I hope AOL’s alleged “good security” past will help keep things cleaner than MySpace, and help keep the 34 year olds away from the 16 year olds. BTW, I don’t think the typical MySpace user knows what Safari is if they don’t even know about Firefox. It’s all about targeted audience, and they are targeting IE users. IE is everywhere, it’s the only option in my college and library, for example.

It may be a horrible overuse of ajax, but again, their targeted audience will probably think that’s cool, and therefore better than MySpace. “Oh wow, it lets you pick themes, colors, and drag boxes!” You really can’t blame AOL for simply doing what works.

all you 35-year old, balding programmers need to go out more and actually have human contact. look, the site looks fine. I bet all of you wrote off myspace, guess what, 75 million users later, and none of you guys get it. its not geared towards you initech developers.AOL is leveraging their strangle hold on the IM market, and have done a pretty good job by doing so.

Despite the obvious bugginess of the site, I think this is a smart play by AOL. They’ve realized that users are turning their MySpace pages into personal aggregators (Photobucket photos, YouTube videos etc) and are making that process a lot more straightforward. It also allows for a high degree of customization, without breaking the page layout. Strategically, it’s a clever move. More here:

http://mashable.com/2006/05/10.....ud-expect/

I think Dan makes some good points (even if he’s a bit more upfront about it that I would have been!). If you don’t get MySpace, then AIMPages almost certainly isn’t for you.

—

Mike Johnston,

“MySpace works because it is quick, easy and manageable.”

You’re kidding, right?

What’s with the chocolate/fudge-colored design theme?

I cannot sign up, as users must be over 16. I see this will limit AOL’s would be market for this web service. You only have to be fourteen to sign up for MySpace however and I think that is part of the success, because kids at school have nothing better to do than sit at home and consume pop culture and talk to friends via the internet. MySpace has made that much easier to do.

Pete, I agree with Mike Johnston, the get-started time between the two is drastically different. MySpace asks contained simple questions like ‘about me’ and ‘who i want to meet’… then the typical movies/music/etc — These are simple questions that set the user up in 2 minutes.

They don’t need to drag and drop anything or “edit a module” just to answer simple questions. MySpace gets the user set up really fast,, and then later as you explore you decide how and what to add to the design & character.

Mike & Todd. Myspace didn’t get to where it is due to speed. Please. Do you know how slow and laggy Myspace is right now?

Its horrendous.

From an investors point of view this is a good move for AOL. The design is good. It uses good eye tracking methods to guide users to content easily.

The user-end controls for managing their profiles is top notch, no problems uploading pictures.

Works with Safari, IE, Mozilla & Opera 9.0.

My crotique? Let’s see how the public takes to it. The public are a crowd of people who would go into Microsoft Word use text art and think its wonderfully looking.

If your expecting every site produced to look like 2Advanced.com your way off your rocker.

Todd, MYspace users like those simple questions BUT its not the reason they are there. Do you know how many sites are out there to help you customize your MYSpace? AOL has pinpointed that and made it another strong point.

This IS the MYSpace killer, you guys need to look at WHY AOL is using modules, why they setup their site the way it is.

AOL didn’t invest money just to lose it. Think about why they did it. After all, they never went wrong before.(ICQ, Winamp, AIM…etc)

Sad to say, they tried to create a rich client using AJAX vs a simple interface.
It is also sad to say, the idea of personalized web page and modules(API) was first showcased in products like MyNetscape.com which was put to death by current management at AOL. Many of the talented people left the company because of these bad decisions and joined Google, Apple and other start ups in Silicon Valley.

I am afraid the remaining team at AOL which is based mostly in Columbus and Virginia are out of touch technically, and socially with what makes the next killer apps and this shows in AIMpages implementation.

This is a business which you either inovate or you reside in graveyard by coming late to the party via copying. Decrease in AIM users, WinAMP, MApQuest, etc. are an indication of this.

It is likely AIMPages speed problems is not due to hardware and rather due to bad implementation.

It is a beta and we went out the door with multiple known bugs and performance issues but we wanted to start getting real feedback sooner. Performance should be better in Firefox; we had to turn off compression for IE because of a browser bug.

You should see performance increases in the next drop to production (in a week or so) as we implement more lazy loading, etc.

Some folks are experiencing what we call “blank page syndrome” where some wacky data from a feed hoses edit mode’s ability to get a lock on the modules in the page. That’s out biggest bug at the moment and we’re working hard to get that patched up. If you have a reproducable case, feel free to mail me at ShawnCarnell at aol.com.

General feedback and bug reports can go to aimpagesteam@aol.com.

Please RE- set my Beta page , it’s stuck and gives me about 7 warnings n a Row,. be-for Then going to white ,and i can not view any of it , or edit it , i have no control at all over the page

it’s been stuck like this for Two Days
Thank you for your Help

——————————————————————————–

This BETA Pages is horrable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
NO ONE BECIDES A PAID PROGRAMER!!! has all this time it takes to use The Edit Features on BETA pages it’s the worse on line Editing i have ever used, EVERyting TAKES FOR EVER!~ you programers get paid , to talke LOTS of TIME! we AOL USER ARE PAYING FOR A SERVICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and were not getting it With this HORRABLE BETA PAGES editing CRAP it will litrally take AN HOUR to do basic EDITING of the page the wait time is Hurnedence, while waiting to make the next edit, i have a verry fast computer and a very fast Borad band, But TRYING TO USE BETA PAGES EDIT, IS worse Than DIAL UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! geesss you Guys get it togeater and fix it , ITS CRAP! WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWAY to SLOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!

all this talk about my space!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yes it is pretty fast, both in set up , otherwise nothing to dray or drop , or WAIT and WAIT to do the nest APPS, like AOL’S Beta page, Beta pages SUCK!

the concept iS GREAT! But the Ability’s to click around “”FAST”"” and get it done and over with it the WORSE I HAVE EVER SEE!

and for Christ sake ,Ive paid AOL a lot of money over the lat 15+ years and now I’m paying for HEAD ACHES! and WAISTING A LOT OF MY TIME trying to USE THERE GOOD LOOKING but SLOWER THAN ice melting apps, i hate it and if it doesn’t get changes to MUCH FASTER soon , Ill leaves AOL ALL TOGETHER, and I’m sure thousands if not millions will too! ;-( And who was the Guinies Who set up the More BIG TIME WAISTER FOR AOL Paying CUSTOMERS………………of when trying to reach “live help: on line now there are all theas stupid questions and a smoke screen of one window after another for the already frustrated AOL PAYING CUSTOMER has to go through to Finally Get “”LIVE HELP SCREEN To FINLAY move to ACTUALLY CONNECT WITH LIVE HELP