Ireland On-Line (IOL) is a former

ISP An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides a myriad of services related to accessing, using, managing, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

. Ireland On-line was the first commercial internet service provider in the state. The company was formed in 1992 by Barry Flanagan, and was reported to have launched "Ireland's first mass-market Internet service" in January 1994. In 1997, the company was bought by

An Post (; literally 'The Post') is the state-owned provider of Mail, postal services in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. An Post provides a "universal postal service" to all parts of the country as a member of the Universal Postal Union. Services provide ...

for IR£2.5m. Two years later, it was sold to Esat Telecom Group plc for IR£ 115m. A year later, Esat Telecom was taken over by

BT Group plc BT Group plc (formerly British Telecom) is a British Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered in London, England. It has operations in around 180 countries and is the largest provider of fixed-li ...

. In 2002 Esat was rebranded Esat BT. In 2009

BT Ireland BT Communications (Ireland) Limited is a telecommunications and internet company in Ireland. It is a subsidiary of BT Group plc. History Esat Telecom The company was founded in 1990 by a consortium headed by business magnate Denis O'Brien a ...

withdrew from retail telecommunications and transferred retail operations, along with IOL's former subscribers, to

Vodafone Ireland Vodafone Ireland Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of Vodafone Group, is a mobile phone network, broadband and TV provider in Ireland. It was created when the Vodafone Group bought Eircell, the mobile arm of Telecom Éireann. As of Septembe ...

Notes

External links

Iol's home page
- now simply a webmail login page for legacy email addresses
Oceanfree.net's home page
{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050414014353/http://www.oceanfree.net/ , date=14 April 2005 - now simply a webmail login page for legacy email addresses Defunct Internet service providers Internet service providers of the Republic of Ireland