Prodigy to Shut Down ‘Classic’ Online Service, Citing Y2K

Prodigy Communications Corp. notified the 208,000 subscribers of its pioneer “Prodigy Classic” online service Friday that it will shut down in October because of the year 2000 computer problem.

The company said the so-called Y2K problem was not expected to affect the 433,000 subscribers of its newer “Prodigy Internet” service, launched in late 1996, and it encouraged its Classic subscribers to enroll there.

Prodigy’s chief executive, Samer Salameh, sent e-mail to subscribers nationwide explaining that the company’s Classic service was “built using proprietary technologies that predate current Internet standards” and the company’s engineers were “unable to make them Y2K compliant.”

“I know that this announcement will be a disappointment to many of you,” Salameh wrote. The announcement also was posted on the company’s “Year 2000 Readiness Disclosure” Web site.

Executives couldn’t be reached late Friday for additional comment.

Prodigy’s Classic service was launched nationally in 1990, years before the booming popularity of the Internet and its World Wide Web.

Prodigy, based in White Plains, N.Y., had 1.13 million subscribers in 1995, but that number has declined sharply in recent years as users fled to Internet service providers that offered faster, more reliable access to the Web.

America Online, the world’s largest Internet provider, has more than 15 million subscribers.

Prodigy never was profitable. In 1996 and 1997, it incurred net losses of $114.1 million and $129.3 million.