Yepyep. I'm on ##math, #python, ##linux, #vim, and some others on freenode. IRC is my hub.
Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
41–50 of 254 posts
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#42I'm a big fan of IRC, and I'm primarily active in small channels on Rizon. From my experience, the kind of people who stick around long term tend to be extremely capable and fun to interact with.
I find small IRC channels have a very high signal to noise ratio, possibly due to what many people see as a high barrier to entry.
I won't lie, I was intimidated when I first used IRC all those years ago, but it quickly became second nature. It's so incredibly easy to use and the client stays open 24x7 in the background without needing to pin browser tabs or otherwise getting in the way.
With proper alerts set up, you don't even need to check it until something interesting happens. Works fantastically, as it has for decades~
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#43I hang out at #lisp, #python, #debian, ##math, ##algorithms, ##security, etc. on Freenode IRC all the time. I remain connected to these channels via ZNC, an IRC network bouncer.
Disclosure: I created ##algorithms in 2007.
Apart from these, there is #fd100 that we created recently to keep the love for Logo (the programming language) alive. It is a tiny channel consisting of 5-10 members. Please do join #fd100 even if you don't remember Logo anymore. The intention here is not to discuss Logo but to share the joy of computing that we discovered through Logo and has remained in our lives. I hope to see you all there. :-)
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#44I'm a big fan of IRC, and I'm primarily active in small channels on Rizon. From my experience, the kind of people who stick around long term tend to be extremely capable and fun to interact with. I find small IRC channels have a very high signal to noise ratio, possibly due to what many people see as a high barrier to entry. I won't lie, I was intimidated when I first used IRC all those years ago, but it quickly beca…
Also, you can implement an IRC client and/or server in about an hour in any decently high-level programming language.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#45Isn't everybody using slack technically also using IRC?
They used to have IRC / XMPP gateways. Closed them down.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#46Perhaps only of passing interest to others here but in 1990s Portugal, IRC was the only way for gay people to chat and meet up outside of bars, before sites like Gaydar took hold and then of course apps like Grindr. I feel like something was lost along the way in the move to dating sites and apps; a general forum (channels) to participate in, rather than just one-to-one messaging which doubled down on the meat market aspects at the expense of any attempt at community building.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#47I used to use Freenode a lot but in recent years have gone elsewhere.
The community just isn't what it was before and a lot of that comes down to numbers. It wasn't long ago that Freenode was the place to go for help with open source projects but I've noticed more and more an exodus to Slack, Discord et cetera. It's fairly common now to be greeted with a channel topic about this and by that point you're not going to get much help from the lurkers that remain.
I'm not sure what drove that but I do recall there being a fair amount of drama in some channels (more discussion around moderation than the project the channel was about), ban happy ops, flooding and various network related technical issues.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#48• Support channels for various open source projects • Fallback in case the new-fangled webshit breaks for the fifth time a month • Old communities that see no point in moving to said often breaking webshit But none of this has any growth potential, so we'll see for how long I'll keep using it.
I'd rather see IRC usage expand over discord and slack use myself... It'd be nice to maybe see an open-source application and bots that allow for better integration with source control and CI/CD options though. This way it's easier for everyone to interact with a more open base standard. While discord isn't too bad, it's sometimes hard to find and join the communities you might be looking for. Where as with freenode,…
I really do like Discord's, UI, and have wanted to build an IRC client with a similar UI, but I'm not sure how difficult a feature-complete client implementation is.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#49I really enjoy using IRC but it badly needs an update to work on phones without requiring the user to have a sign up for a 3rd party service (irc cloud, shell providers to run a bnc).
IRCv3 is out there but it seems to me to be simultaneously overengineered and underfeatured. I don't think they're focusing their efforts into the right areas to make IRC relevant again.
Re: Ask HN: Curious to know if people still use IRC?
#50It's been mostly reduced to free software projects channels/networks and just semi-private channels for groups of friends who've been on IRC for years now. So #archlinux, #dolphin-emu, #python, ##machinelearning, etc. all on Freenode are pretty active. There's some hobby and subreddit related channels too. Like ##chess, and #rubik. Other than that, the language learning community was surprisingly very active years ag…
I was once surprised to find that there is also active porn IRC servers. It's unexpectedly mainstream.