AOL Disks as Collector Items
Posted on August 4, 2006
AOL recently announced plans to offer free email and other services to subscribers that already have a broadband connection. These probably means an end to the omnipresent AOL CD-ROMs. CNN's The Browser blog sort-of suggests that this could be an eBay opportunity.
As maligned as it is, the AOL CD got millions of Americans onto the Internet for the first time, speeding the explosive growth of the Internet economy. But of course you didn't have to particularly like AOL to be an aficionado of the colorful disks; NoMoreAOLCDs.com has collected almost 400,000 in an effort to persuade AOL to stop mailing them. (You won, guys.) Other avid collectors just like the looks of the CDs, organizing their freebies by version, number of free hours, and the fictional character featured. (After AOL bought Time Warner, the publisher of CNNMoney.com, in 2001, Warner Bros. characters like Bugs Bunny and Harry Potter started showing up on CDs.) Another CD-obsessed individual built a throne out of 4,000 CDs.update 7-11-18: There are currently hundreds of listings for AOL CDs on eBay. Lion King and Harry Potter promo AOL CDs look the be the highest listed CDs so far. None of them sell for very large amounts. Could there really be a market here? People will collect just about anything but the rarer AOL CDs tied to films and other promotions are most likely going to be the ones that grow in value.
Update 8-7-06
It looks like Rod Stewart, Britney Spears, Bridget Jones, Shrek and Lord of the Rings AOL CDs are also selling above the $2 or $3 mark. If you have any film or music related AOL promo CDs you might want to hang on to them. We can't imagine the plain AOL CDs ever having any value. There are just too many them around.
The rise and fall of AOL and discussed in the CNBC video. AOL once had a market cap of over $220 billion:
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