AOL Launches Phoneline Service

Well the time has come... AOL officially launched their Phoneline service on Monday and are pushing the Free service along with free phone number. Cutely referred to as "Free Digits" they are pushing the free phone number as the main selling point to this service hoping to get a lot of takers. Coupled with the fact that it will work with the existing AIM messaging software it should be a relatively easy sell.

The real question is will they get new customers because of this or will it just be something that existing users will buy into? I know profit is not the motivation for offering this service since they are giving it away for free (they do have an up scale to an unlimited plan though).

From a user perspective I think this will be a nice service and they are doing a good job with the marketing side, but I really don't think it will change AOLs bottom line or paid subscriber base much.