WebProNews

AOL's debut of free 2GB e-mail boxes for its AIM client users has grown to a million active accounts in five weeks.

It looks like everyone's chance at winning the AIM e-mail promotion and its MINI Cooper grand prize will be at least one in a million. According to AOL, a million of its AIM users have activated their free e-mail accounts.

AOL has quietly moved from being a self-contained, subscription-driven Internet service provider, to a portal company offering advertiser-supported, search engine indexable, freely available content.

And AOL was lauded for its coverage of the recent Live 8 concerts around the world. While other outlets like Viacom's MTV fumbled their coverage with poorly placed commercial breaks and too-hip VJs stealing time from the performers, AOL delivered a lot of great moments.

The company now will take another step at increasing the usefulness of its AIM and AOL-branded e-mail accounts. Working with Mountain View-based Plaxo, AOL hopes to better position itself against other free e-mail providers like Google's Gmail and Yahoo! Mail.

Plaxo's services will allow AOL and AIM members to sync Outlook, Outlook Express, and third party e-mail address books with their existing accounts. Within Outlook and Outlook Express, Plaxo users will be able to tell from their contact lists if a contact is available for IM chat.

David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business. Email him here.