AOL on the blink?

Sent an email today to a few people but got bounce-back messages from
two of them who are both on AOL, with the following explanation:

5.1.2 - Bad destination host 'DNS Hard Error looking up aol.com (A):
domain has no A record'

Anyone know what this means?

George

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
George Weston <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>Sent an email today to a few people but got bounce-back messages from
>two of them who are both on AOL, with the following explanation:
>
>5.1.2 - Bad destination host 'DNS Hard Error looking up aol.com (A):
>domain has no A record'
>
>Anyone know what this means?

AOL's DNS seems to be broken at the moment, they have neither an MX record
(Mail Exchange host) nor an A record (IPv4 address) so there is no way
to deliver mail to them.

Nick
--
Serendipity: http://www.leverton.org/blosxom (last update 29th March 2010)
"The Internet, a sort of ersatz counterfeit of real life"
-- Janet Street-Porter, BBC2, 19th March 1996

On 21/12/2010 09:49, Nick Leverton wrote:
> In article<(E-Mail Removed)>,
> George Weston<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>> Sent an email today to a few people but got bounce-back messages from
>> two of them who are both on AOL, with the following explanation:
>>
>> 5.1.2 - Bad destination host 'DNS Hard Error looking up aol.com (A):
>> domain has no A record'
>>
>> Anyone know what this means?
>
> AOL's DNS seems to be broken at the moment, they have neither an MX record
> (Mail Exchange host) nor an A record (IPv4 address) so there is no way
> to deliver mail to them.
>
> Nick

Thanks, Nick.

George

On Tue, 21 Dec 2010 09:49:28 UTC, Nick Leverton <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote:

> In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
> George Weston <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> >Sent an email today to a few people but got bounce-back messages from
> >two of them who are both on AOL, with the following explanation:
> >
> >5.1.2 - Bad destination host 'DNS Hard Error looking up aol.com (A):
> >domain has no A record'
> >
> >Anyone know what this means?
>
> AOL's DNS seems to be broken at the moment, they have neither an MX record
> (Mail Exchange host) nor an A record (IPv4 address) so there is no way
> to deliver mail to them.

Hmm, my mail list is only getting that type of bounce for *some* aol
addresses not all.

--
Regards
Dave Saville

Dave Saville wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2010 09:49:28 UTC, Nick Leverton <(E-Mail Removed)>
> wrote:
>
>> In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
>> George Weston <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>>> Sent an email today to a few people but got bounce-back messages from
>>> two of them who are both on AOL, with the following explanation:
>>>
>>> 5.1.2 - Bad destination host 'DNS Hard Error looking up aol.com (A):
>>> domain has no A record'
>>>
>>> Anyone know what this means?
>> AOL's DNS seems to be broken at the moment, they have neither an MX record
>> (Mail Exchange host) nor an A record (IPv4 address) so there is no way
>> to deliver mail to them.
>
> Hmm, my mail list is only getting that type of bounce for *some* aol
> addresses not all.
>
That probably means SOME DNS lookups work, while others fail
I saw the same on Youtube a few days ago.


Some messy cyber wars going on out there.

Pete Zahut <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> [...] AOL had already earned the nickname of
> AOHell and were being rubbished even then - maybe things never improve?

AOL improved *tremendously* a few years ago. (Mind you, I'd still prefer
not to be a customer of theirs.)

Chris

In article <ieqdg4$rk$(E-Mail Removed)>,
The Natural Philosopher <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>Dave Saville wrote:
>> On Tue, 21 Dec 2010 09:49:28 UTC, Nick Leverton <(E-Mail Removed)>
>> wrote:

>>> AOL's DNS seems to be broken at the moment, they have neither an MX record
>>> (Mail Exchange host) nor an A record (IPv4 address) so there is no way
>>> to deliver mail to them.
>>
>> Hmm, my mail list is only getting that type of bounce for *some* aol
>> addresses not all.
>>
>That probably means SOME DNS lookups work, while others fail
>I saw the same on Youtube a few days ago.

Quite probably. I didn't have time this morning to do a full recursive
check, but a problem in one of their nameservers would cause this symptom.

This evening the domain is showing as OK.

Nick
--
Serendipity: http://www.leverton.org/blosxom (last update 29th March 2010)
"The Internet, a sort of ersatz counterfeit of real life"
-- Janet Street-Porter, BBC2, 19th March 1996