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In 1987, Case was promoted again to executive vice-president. Kimsey quickly began to groom Case to take over the role of CEO, which he did when Kimsey retired in 1991. Kimsey altered the company's technique, and in 1985, released a dedicated online service for Commodore 64 and 128 computer systems, originally called Quantum Link ("Q-Link" for brief).
The service was various from other online services as it utilized the computing power of the Commodore 64 and the Apple II instead of just a "dumb" terminal. Did you see this? passed tokens backward and forward and offered a repaired rate service customized for house users. In May 1988, Quantum and Apple introduced Apple, Link Personal Edition for Apple II and Macintosh computer systems.
After the business parted methods with Apple in October 1989, Quantum altered the service's name to America Online. Case promoted and offered AOL as the online service for people not familiar with computer systems, in contrast to Compu, Serve, which was well established in the technical community. From the beginning, AOL consisted of online games in its mix of items; numerous timeless and casual video games were included in the original Play, Net software system.
In February 1991, AOL for DOS was launched using a Geo, Functions user interface followed a year later on by AOL for Windows. This accompanied development in pay-based online services, like Prodigy, Compu, Serve, and GEnie. 1991 also saw the intro of an original Dungeons & Dragons title called from Stormfront Studios; which was one of the first Multiplayer Online Function Playing Games to depict the experience with graphics instead of text.
Ads invited modem owners to "Attempt America Online FREE", promising complimentary software and trial subscription. AOL ceased Q-Link and PC Link in late 1994. In September 1993, AOL included Usenet access to its features. This is typically described as the "Eternal September", as Usenet's cycle of brand-new users was formerly dominated by smaller sized numbers of college and university freshmen getting in September and taking a few weeks to adjust.