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Internet Relay Chat Turns 30—and We Remember How It Changed Our Lives

posted by takyon on Tuesday October 16 2018, @10:22PM   
from the small-talk dept.

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for BoyceMagooglyMonkey

Internet Relay Chat turns 30—and we remember how it changed our lives

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) turned 30 this August.

The venerable text-only chat system was first developed in 1988 by a Finnish computer scientist named Jarkko Oikarinen. Oikarinen couldn't have known at the time just how his creation would affect the lives of people around the world, but it became one of the key early tools that kept Ars Technica running as a virtual workplace—it even lead to love and marriage.

To honor IRC's 30th birthday, we're foregoing the cake and flowers in favor of some memories. Three long-time Ars staffers share some of their earliest IRC interactions, which remind us that the Internet has always been simultaneously wonderful and kind of terrible.

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Original Submission

• Re:Aaah, the good old days of the internet... Re:Aaah, the good old days of the internet... (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 16 2018, @10:38PM (3 children)

  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 16 2018, @10:38PM (#749687)

  Before the censorship, before the normies.

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• Re:Aaah, the good old days of the internet... (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 16 2018, @10:53PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 16 2018, @10:53PM (#749690)

  Before the dark web, before the Silk Road.

  I'll take today's internet.

  Parent

• Re:Aaah, the good old days of the internet... (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @02:29AM

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 17 2018, @02:29AM (#749782)

  You speak of the Second Age of the Internet, when the geeks of Númenor were still in charge.

  Then came Eternal September and the Third Age when the twits in Mordor gained power.

  
  Ash kraun *dramatic thunderclap and darkness descends as the vile tongue of Zuckerfuck is spoken* durbatulûk, ash kraun gimbatul,
  ash kraun thrakatulûk, agh burzum-ishi krimpatul

  Parent

• Re:Aaah, the good old days of the internet... (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday October 17 2018, @06:19PM

  by DeathMonkey (1380) on Wednesday October 17 2018, @06:19PM (#750064) Journal

  Before the censorship...

  Yeah....kicks and bans didn't exist on IRC....

  Parent