# The one good thing AOL had going for it... **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 21, 2002, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306 "2002-10-21T23:52:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![SwimmingRiddles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SwimmingRiddles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SwimmingRiddles)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2002, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/1 "2002-10-21T23:52:30Z")
Many moons ago, when the world was new and I was but a wee Swiddle, I fell into the nieve trap of subscribing to AOL. The WWW was new and shiney and I didn’t know any better. Before I wised up and got free email from my school, I did become dependant on the AOL feature where you can check to see if email sent from one AOL user to another had been read and if not, you could unsend it. I really miss that feature, especially after the wine-assisted over-emotional email I sent to my ex-boyfriend last night. So I got to thinking. Aside from firewalls and stuff, how hard would it be to set something like that up in the real internet? Do individual emails get something like an ISP number, and can you track that? And does anyone with a gift for software design and networking want to get on that before Ex-boyfriend reads said email? Please? Honestly, I just want to make the world and the internet a more [stalker] convenient place. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/2 "2002-10-22T00:22:54Z")
In theory, any ISP could support unsend requests, but most don’t. Who knows? That might become a standard feature in the near future. ---
**Author:** ![Kat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b19c9b/32.png) [@Kat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kat)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/3 "2002-10-22T02:48:52Z")
I know that we can do that with (internal) email at work, where they use Outlook. Don’t know if we can do it to emails sent outside the company or not. ---
**Author:** ![truthbot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@truthbot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthbot)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/4 "2002-10-22T06:31:54Z")
There has been many a time I wished for an “undo” button for email. Alcohol+sentimentality _does not_ equal “witty” or “heartfelt” missives. _sigh_ ---
**Author:** ![White\_Lightning](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/5 "2002-10-22T07:50:42Z")
I loved that too. The voicemail system at my school worked like that too, which I took advantage of on _many_ occasions. ---
**Author:** ![SwimmingRiddles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SwimmingRiddles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SwimmingRiddles)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/6 "2002-10-22T19:08:32Z")
Hey, Kat: where in Outlook is the option to do that? Of course, it won’t help for this particular email problem, but I wonder if I can do it internally within my domain. ---
**Author:** ![UrbanChic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9dc877/32.png) [@UrbanChic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UrbanChic)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/7 "2002-10-22T19:13:37Z")
In the Sent Items folder, Swimming, locate your message. Double click it to open it and access the Action menu. There, select Recall this message. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2002, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/8 "2002-10-23T15:06:24Z")
Don’t forget the **best** thing AOL ever had going for it. It was the original home of the Straight Dope site and this message board. ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2002, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/9 "2002-10-23T22:24:23Z")
I, too, have really, really missed this feature after my departure from AOL. Of course, even in AOL if you sent the mail to any POP3 account you couldn’t unsend. ---
**Author:** ![Kitsune1527](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Kitsune1527](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kitsune1527)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2002, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/10 "2002-10-24T11:18:23Z")
I have AOL, and I never knew you could do that . . . ---
**Author:** ![EggNogg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/eb8c5e/32.png) [@EggNogg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EggNogg)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2002, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/11 "2002-10-24T14:11:27Z")
Luckily I tend to forget my passwords when under the influence, so some of my more “misguided” e-mail attemps never see the light of day. egg ---
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2002, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-one-good-thing-aol-had-going-for-it/133306/12 "2002-10-24T14:47:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SwimmingRiddles \* > \*\*the wine-assisted over-emotional email I sent to my ex-boyfriend last night. \*\* Could have been worse. . . It could have been a drunken _phone call_ to your ex. . . Not that I’ve ever done that. . . :rolleyes: Tripler O Tequila, how you mock me. . .