EWorld



eWorld was a short-lived online service of Apple Inc.

History
In the early 1990s as online services were becoming widely popular Apple was looking into replacing their aging dealer-only online service known as AppleLink. The dealer-only service was jointly run by GE Information Services and Apple. The service had begun in 1985 as a means to reduce the cost of supporting the company's worldwide network of authorized dealers. It quickly became the de facto e-mail system for Apple and its various dealers. John Ebbs, Apple's head of support, convinced the management that the system ought to be Macintosh-based to take advantage of the Mac's graphical interface.

Before the advent of eWorld Apple had started a consumer oriented online support service known as AppleLink&mdash;Personal Edition. This service was run by Quantum Computer Services. Quantum's Steve Case moved to California for three months to convince Apple to let Quantum run the consumer service. In 1987 Apple allowed Quantum to run the service and granted them use of the Apple logo. Apple received a 10 percent royalty for all the system's users while Quantum made their money by actually running the service.

The ideologies of the companies soon clashed. Quantum wanted to bundle the AppleLink software with new Macs and distribute it through direct marketing. Apple didn't believe in giving away non-system software for free. That coupled with Apple's strict design guidelines caused Quantum to eventually terminate their contract. Steve Case had, however, negotiated a rather beneficial contract for them granting them rights to the use of the Apple logo and disallowed Apple from marketing their own online service.

In 1991 Quantum renamed themselves America Online and opened their service up to PC and Macintosh users. Apple wanted out of their contract with GE which was costing them far more money than it was saving and wanted to provide their own Mac-only competition to AOL's service. They canceled their GE contract and formed an Online Services Group. The group bought the AppleLink software from AOL and developed into what would be known as eWorld. The group also struck a deal with AOL to help develop the service and spent 1993 working on the new software and various services to be offered.

eWorld
On January 5, 1994, Apple announced eWorld at Apple Fest. On June 20 of that year the service went into full operation. The eWorld service was a combination of the vast technical and support archives of the previous AppleLink services and a more traditional community service like AOL and CompuServe. The primary portal of the service was the eWorld software. The software was based around a "town hall" theme where each of the services branches were individual "buildings". The software was Mac-only but a Windows version was promised to appear in 1995.

The town hall metaphor made eWorld simple to access and provided users with a strong sense of community. Several Mac software and hardware companies opened up virtual forums on the service to provide customer support and general product information to subscribers. The main eWorld portal also linked up to various news services.

The two most widely used parts of eWorld were the eMail Center and Community Center. The Community Center was an online BBS where thousands of ePeople (eWorld users) congregated to chat about various subjects. The eMail Center was a virtual post office and provided most ePeople with their first ever exposure to e-mail. The service also housed reams of support and technical documents.

Demise
However, it turned out that eWorld was launched as the heyday of proprietary online services was ending due to the spread of Internet access.

The service cost $8.95 per month which included two free night-time or weekend hours. Subsequent hours were $4.95 with weekday (6 am–6 pm) hours costing $7.95. Apple kept the service price high originally to keep the demand moderated but never dropped the price when the demand did not materialize. After the first year of service eWorld had 90,000 subscribers. In 1995 limited Internet service was made available and as of September 1995 the service only had 115,000 subscribers, compared to AOL's 3.5 million.

The Windows version of eWorld never materialised. The service was only available on the Macintosh and e-mail only support on the Newton handheld. CEO Michael Spindler told the Online Services Group marketing for the service wasn't needed and so it shipped on new Macs buried five folders deep. There was also little if anything in the way of media marketing for the service. A majority of Mac users had no idea eWorld even existed and little noise was made in the Mac press over the service.

Finally on March 31, 1996, at 12:01 am the service shut down. Apple's management decided that the product was doomed to fail in a market where AOL had such a commanding lead. The company was also trying desperately to cut costs anywhere possible. In June 1995 the company had over $1 billion in backorders and posted a $68 million loss in the fourth quarter of 1995. In January Spindler was asked to resign as CEO and was replaced by former CEO of National Semiconductor Gil Amelio. Several products and projects were scrapped in an effort to put the company back into the black.

When the Online Services Group was disbanded many of its members left Apple and eventually formed TalkCity.com.