What Ever Happened to ICQ?

[loki1944]

Ah ICQ... how I miss thee. I remember first subscribing in the late nineties as I had just moved to a new city and was looking to make some new contacts on the way.

One of the best features (ironically would be considered one of the most perverse nowadays) was the people search function. You could literally narrow down your search to sex, country, city, online status!

I remember having 10+ chat windows all open at the same time, as one endeavoured to make new friends and acquaintances in a strange new city!

If I hadn't used ICQ back in the day, I wouldn't have met the person who eventually introduced me to my future wife

That's awesome.

 

[bviktor]

I was an IRC person. Wasted sooooo many hours idling in stupid channels lol. I was so pissed at XChat for not being free on Windows I ended up releasing it for free myself. Some might remember.

For 1on1, we used MSN/WLM for like a decade. Then came FB and smashed everything. Nowadays more and more of my contacts pop up on Telegram tho, thankfully.

 

[Shawshanks]

This... my old UIN 5431887, call me up

Mine's 1254476... smaller number epeen! Hahaha

 

[GirlDownunder]

In my country there was quick switch from ICQ to FB chat. Sadly. I remember having alternative clients like Miranda, which had transparency and looked really great.
What really crippled chatting was move from open protocols to proprietaty. You could have FB chat in other clients, not anymore.

https://www.wikihow.com/Add-Facebook-Chat-to-Pidgin

 

[Red999]

I didn't have mobile phone. using icq, I could send sms to my friends and icq used static number per user for free.
it used polish number though, while I was in Indonesia. my friends would be charged for international sms rate for replying

 

[CharmsD]

I never had ICQ, I used Yahoo Messenger over MSN because it had a "watch with me" plugin for YouTube. This wasn't all that long ago! A group of us used Tinychat's website together for video chat, once we had an interloper find the room who took admin when no one was on, to record us. He picked a bad night, nothing happened, everyone was tired.

Mobile phones and FB ruined everything.

 

[RebelGTP]

Mine's 1254476... smaller number epeen! Hahaha

569557

 

[Astromania]

I found ICQ recently buried deep in my hard drive and stumbled across this blog while trying to figure out if I could still run it... Whenever I've upgraded my PC in the past I just dump the contents of the old drive into the new drive as advances in hdd capacity usually mean it only takes up a fraction of the drive. Anyway, ICQ was buried in the fourth layer down and evidently I last used it on 26 September 2000! A lifetime ago - I was still an ***** back then...well, more of an ***** anyway. My UIN was 500897...I do recall in the dying days (at least of my use of ICQ anyway) the lower UINs were worn like some sort of nerdy badge of honour haha.

 

[tsar1]

Mail.ru is a Russian company. The only thing she knows how to do is turn good projects into ****.

 

[evolucion8]

Download software from a Russian company on a Russian domain, no thanks. I'm sure Russian programmers are excellent at what they do but I feel there's too much of a risk if there being some kind of nefarious back door included.

But then you aren't concerned about USA big brother policies tracking down your Facebook, Apple phones call history an even your Alexa stuff lol.

 

[CybaGirl]

I tried logging in on the website with my UIN, but it says incorrect login or password. But I know my details are right as I saved them to Roboform.

Maybe I should download the client and see if I can log in there?

 

[Geralt]

I have ICQ. It has all you need anno 2022.

 

[Guyver1wales]

55886389

not thought about ICQ in like 15 years and yet my number is still seared into the back of my brain

 

[raember]

Great, 296176 still works. Had to set a strong password - not a problem.

 

[BuckarooBonzaii]

ICQ, the good old days when it was fun. Those days are gone with all the rubbish today.

 

[trieste1s]

375_5373, with the missing digit an even one. When we were younger, when there was less useless data cluttering our minds, it's easier to memorise short strings of digits.

 

[WhoCaresAnymore]

Kali for multi-Duke3d and ICQ. The simpler days. But then again, I was the only one in the group with DSL, the rest were dial up. I had to host everything.

 

[dgoodchild]

I met my wife through ICQ.

 

[IgrySteamRU]

My ICQ number was created about in 2003, still remember it.
One guy bought some ICQ number for about 8$ from me, because it was "green". Don't know what does it mean. =)
Also, it's funny, but first screen there from some russian device. didn't expect that, I think it's cool =)

 

[2226]

mail.ru...
Wow... I once tried the mail.ru app on my Android phone. I needed a better email app than that standard one to use with my own email server. Unfortunately the mail.ru didn't meet the grade so I uninstalled it. Yet after installation I could still see logins and searches in my mail server logs originating from the mail.ru servers.

Tread lightly with Russian apps.

 

[Grinnie Jax]

My ICQ number was created about in 2003, still remember it.
One guy bought some ICQ number for about 8$ from me, because it was "green". Don't know what does it mean. =)
Also, it's funny, but first screen there from some russian device. didn't expect that, I think it's cool =)

Cyrillic alphabet is not Russian exclusive

 

[FaTaL]

The new message sound 'ut oh' still lives in my head rent free

 

[RedGuard]

Guess I can write my own ICQ. With user details and completely illegal nowadays.

It was fun searching for girls between 14 and 18 from different parts of the country. Or the world. Had some cool friends from the other side of the planet.