How many years have you been on IRC?

ed · Last edited by ed on Jan 22, 2004 4:19pm; edited 1 time in total

I'm interested to know how long people have been on IRC. Vote now!

zeke · Idler Joined: 04 Oct 2003 Posts: 324

it's either, 5, or 6...I'm not sure which...so I'll go with 5...

moonman · Lurker Joined: 15 Jul 2003 Posts: 212

7 years for me. since i was a a 15-year-old high school sophomore.

openglx · none Joined: 17 Jul 2003 Posts: 28

Since 1996 I'm a IRCER :)

I was 9-year old, quite young for IRCing, no? Not on those days, where people really wanted to have good talking..

U · Eleet Joined: 18 Jun 2003 Posts: 521 Location: IRC

7 years, 3 running a network or at least a server on one.

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

Finally, some others who have been on IRC more than 10 years! It was April 14th, 1993 for me. TCP/IP through an Apple IIGS. 2400 baud modem. I found my way to EFnet about a month later. I don't know how long it was before I realized that all servers do NOT lead to the same network, and I was actually hanging out in a channel with the same name on Undernet.

Oh yeah, and I was only eight years old. (crossing fingers behind back)

[DiMENSiON] · Eleet Joined: 06 Sep 2003 Posts: 621

A small, 3 for me... since i had the internet... :oD ...

U · Eleet Joined: 18 Jun 2003 Posts: 521 Location: IRC

Actually I believe I did use IRC before then, but it was only once or twice, on rare occasions, I didn't become a steady user for about a year or so. I remember being on Dalnet for its second anniversary, so maybe I'm more in the upper years, but I think 6-7 is about right.

tiko · none Joined: 24 Sep 2003 Posts: 49

In the stone age, I was dialing up my local BBS to play LORD, in '92.. My friend 'David' had a very nice 386 we played Leisure Suit Larry on.. Very Happy

In 1993, my family and I, (mostly I) decided to buy a top of the line machine.. the incredible speed of it's 14.4 modem and the influence of some real life friends led me to IRC.

I can't recall my _first_ network, but Dalnet does come to mind when i think of where I chatted with local pals.. oh how I miss the dial in BBS. Sad

Oh crap, I forgot to mention... My first ISP.. AOL.. :shock:

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

/me sheepishly admits that in the month between getting hooked up to the internet and finding IRC, I was an AOL user. Just about everyone was back then. AOL had everything bundled up with a great graphics program. The internet was a great big void. I remember an IRC op happily telling me Undernet's userbase just hit 3000. Not for his server, for the entire network. The help channel where I idled was lucky to see five people come and go all day. Newsgroups were equally stimulating. The web was in its infancy. I was working on a Mac, and every internet program available to me was buggy as hell and crashed whenever you asked it actually DO something.

I don't remember getting a 14,400 modem until at least 1995... well after I bought my PowerMac. That was SO fast! Most of my work was sent via email, so it was awesome when I no longer had to wait all night to get a photoshop file. On 14,400 it took less than an hour!

Today, there are more IRC networks created in a day, than existed in the first 5 years of IRC history. My how times are changing.

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

tiko, couldn't have been DALnet if you started in 1993. DAL didn't open until July of '94.

Really the only game in town was EFnet until Undernet split off in (I think) March, 1993.... and although it grew fast for that time period, it was below 5,000 users until very late 94, or even 95. Back then, DALnet was TINY... just for Trekkies and other SIMs. Not sure when mIRC put it at the top of their servers.ini list, but thats when DALnet became the first stop for new users. People would look at their services, then compare them to what Undernet and EFnet offered, and go back and start their channels on DALnet.

tiko · none Joined: 24 Sep 2003 Posts: 49

Yep, you're right. Maybe it was EFNet.. i dunno. It could have even been later; I was but a wee youngster in those days Razz

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

[DiMENSiON] · Eleet Joined: 06 Sep 2003 Posts: 621

I'm still a wee youngster! :oP

]x[ · none Joined: 23 Nov 2003 Posts: 6

Was some time back, went to a new school (1998) and found a nice java chat with the rest of the class. There we messed around till some script kiddies started kicking us off. Flooding us etc. Then it was not long before some members of our class including me found out the way to return the favour :twisted:

Then i started playing Planetarion ( online real time strategy game ) and they had an irc netwerk where you would organize defence and attacks. Since then i used irc. First with my 56k modem then with my adsl.

There will follow many more years Smile