[HN Gopher] Why Real Life is better than IRC (2000)
___________________________________________________________________
Why Real Life is better than IRC (2000)
Author : themaxdavitt
Score : 26 points
Date : 2026-01-09 21:01 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (everything2.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (everything2.com)
| bitwize wrote:
| This is why I resolved to meet my now-wife in person, some 20
| years after we first met on IRC.
| emtel wrote:
| I can't believe everything2 still exists!
| NoWayDude1 wrote:
| That was my first reaction without even reading. 27 years and
| still running!
| keithnz wrote:
| I was on IRC really early, 91, and it was great, there wasn't
| that many people on there and it felt way more international and
| you naturally ended up talking to people from all around the
| world (I'm from NZ). I even did two overseas trips to meet all
| kinds of people in real life and experiencing all kinds of slices
| of other peoples worlds. As more and more people got on the
| internet people ended up talking much more with locals (except
| for special interest groups). I'm still in contact with one of
| the very first friends I made on IRC (who is in the US) and have
| met them multiple times over the years
| kankerlijer wrote:
| Same. I randomly had time off and someone in IRC noticed. I
| traveled from the US to Germany to hang out with them. Their
| brother was involved in BMW racing, and we hung out at
| Stuttgart for a few weekends in a trailer. Some of the best
| weeks of my life.
| crims0n wrote:
| As the last generation that remembers what life was like before
| the internet, we need to ask ourselves - is the world we built
| better than the one we were born into? The older I get, the less
| convinced I am. It's not just nostalgia, as affirmed by Gen Zs
| rejection of the digital world.
| anonymous908213 wrote:
| I don't think this is a very difficult question to answer. The
| internet of the year 2000 made the world a better place. The
| internet of the year 2025 makes the world a much, _much_ worse
| place. We now live in an era where not only governments but
| every private business willing to pay a data broker has access
| to unlimited data for roughly every individual in a population,
| including their age, gender, occupation, hobbies, friends,
| political positions, sleep schedule, every phone call they 've
| ever made, every website they've ever visited, every location
| they've ever taken their phone, every thing they've ever
| purchased. This information is currently used to shape the
| course of politics by manipulating what every individual sees,
| and will undoubtedly be used for unthinkable crimes against
| humanity in the coming years.
| quietsegfault wrote:
| I'm not sure that's the /internet/'s fault, but the
| humanities inability to anticipate what we can do with the
| technology and our inability to regulate the technology to
| prevent harms.
| georgemcbay wrote:
| > humanities inability to anticipate what we can do with
| the technology
|
| I think it is more a problem of not _caring_ (especially
| when not caring will result in social and /or economic
| reward) rather than not anticipating.
|
| For any technology that is created you can and should
| anticipate that it will be, literally, weaponized since
| there are hundreds of thousands of years of precedent for
| this happening.
| immibis wrote:
| We - technologists - mocked the humanities for decades for
| being useless. Now look where we got without them.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| > The internet of the year 2000 made the world a better place
|
| How so? Because we could send mail instantly instead of using
| a stamp and envelope?
|
| Because we could buy stuff without leaving the house?
|
| Because we could read/listen to/watch stuff without paying
| the people who created it?
| anonymous908213 wrote:
| For many reasons, but if I had to pick one for brevity:
| because there was unprecedented access to educational
| information, allowing anyone to learn about the world and
| develop skills that would typically have required a
| university education. Of course, even that has been
| corrupted, and now while the information still exists it is
| drowned out by orders of magnitude more misinformation.
|
| That's not to say that the internet in 2000 was without
| flaws, but I do think on net it was beneficial to humanity.
| 1bpp wrote:
| Yes. The current generation of creatives could not exist as
| it is without free information and pirated professional
| software.
| kace91 wrote:
| >Because we could read/listen to/watch stuff without paying
| the people who created it?
|
| I can tell you I wouldn't be anywhere close to where I am
| without this, yes.
|
| First because I (/my parents) didn't have the money, second
| because of pure geographical access.
|
| I saw movies and shows from countries that would never sell
| near me, read books that would never be in my country's
| libraries, took courses straight from scientists and
| engineers rather than a thrice translated work...
|
| The barrier of entry was also useful, curiosity is much
| better fed when you can download a medicine textbook just
| to check rather than venturing into the library of a
| university you're not part of.
|
| That is the one thing the internet did right, spreading
| culture. It was over when they took boredom from us, that
| was the big evil.
| huhkerrf wrote:
| There has been a lot of bad things about the technology of the
| past 30 years, but I refuse to say that things were fantastic
| pre-Internet. The fact that I can listen to any music I want
| for less than it cost me to buy a CD in 1995, not even adjusted
| for inflation, is amazing. The massive CD book I carried around
| is definitely nostalgia.
|
| Or, I can think of something, and find the answer quickly. I
| can make friends with people (or argue with them) across
| continents.
|
| Still, there are things that I do miss that were objectively
| "worse." Like there only being a few dozen channels, and cable
| TV being less important, so you knew everyone was watching the
| same thing. There seemed to be more of a shared culture.
| AuthAuth wrote:
| There is no "GenZ rejection of the digital world" thats a
| marketing narrative. Gen Z is overwhelmingly online and the
| handful that do reject it are no more than a rounding error.
| venndeezl wrote:
| _We_ built?
|
| You mean innumerate and STEM ignorant politicians manipulated
| by tech bros high on their own supply financially engineered
| into existence?
|
| Poverty wages everywhere except tech jobs was intentional.
| Ignoring the externalities like reliance on sweatshop labor and
| sacrificing diverse skills development was intentional. Little
| different than what they are doing with the ICE hiring bonus.
|
| They got employees to go where they wanted; not operating from
| a diverse playbook:
| https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/27/business/job-insecurity-o...
|
| Offshoring the late 90s and 00s was 100% meant to protect
| Intel, copyright; this isn't anything we did. Broad strokes
| were gamed out 2 decades ago.
|
| The elder politicians don't want Americans in a position to
| win. They didn't want the risk of open compute production
| thriving in America; back in the 00s Napster made the threat to
| their IP and copyright schemes obvious.
|
| They want political serfdom, fealty to elders delusion about
| themselves. We did little but follow orders because what choice
| did we have?
|
| I am not owning this circus.
| tac19 wrote:
| If you think there is ever any other outcome for a democracy,
| you are part owner in what we built. Corruption and capture
| are inevitable, and blaming the particular politicians in
| power today, misses the point. They're only in power because
| at every step along the way, we the people happily swallowed
| beautiful lies in exchange for the "freebies" that trickled
| down to us.
|
| If you imagine we just got unlucky with the _wrong_ people in
| power, you haven't yet learned the real lesson, and are
| doomed to support the entire thing continuing, or being
| reborn in new form.
| jl6 wrote:
| To answer this question honestly, you have to ask: if you could
| time travel back to live in, say, 1990, would you? You don't
| get to just dial the internet back to 1990, you have to dial
| the rest of the world back too. The world is a package deal.
|
| I think a lot of people would be tempted by the nostalgia, but
| would quickly realize how much they'd be giving up.
| atherton94027 wrote:
| What would they be giving up? DoorDash?
|
| By most aspects the world of 1990 didn't change that much
| from today's world, with the exception of having computers in
| our pockets and some advances in medicine.
| doubled112 wrote:
| I think you can go back further
|
| I used to work with a guy who would tell me that, except
| email, life didn't really change since the 80s. All we did
| was stick a screen onto everything, whether we needed to or
| not.
|
| I was only born in the 90s but I mostly agree that far
| back.
| immibis wrote:
| It's hard to commit to saying yes but it's also hard to
| commit to saying no.
| ferguess_k wrote:
| For me the late 80s - early 2000s was the peak. But I guess
| every generation has their own peak and I totally respect that.
|
| That said, the later generations probably are going to have a
| more shitty life, because of economic downturn since 2008. I
| can't even imagine what kind of life my son (5Y) is going to
| live through whence the cyberpunk world falls.
| jrm4 wrote:
| First of all
|
| Everything2 is still around? whoooa, totally forgot about that.
| Gotta definitely get back into that. That seems like one of those
| great anti-modern-social-media ideas that the kids might like to
| learn about.
| aforty wrote:
| Ah damn this brings back memories... shout out if you were on
| #windows98, #windows2000 or #windowsxp on EFnet circa 97-01.
| corykrug wrote:
| or #winxp but I could be thinking of DALnet...
| noneparticular wrote:
| Really... not sure I can agree with any of this.
|
| >If you do phone a friend at 4am to say "I'm down" they take it
| seriously.
|
| Well, I mean I've never had friends so I can't really say too
| much about that. But I never really had anyone in my life that
| would do that so... eh?
|
| > In RL, you can be alone on purpose without seeming antisocial.
|
| >People try to get you to stay "just a little longer" and make
| you feel wanted.
|
| No one's ever done that for me. Quite the opposite actually. I'm
| rather repulsive in real life so most people would prefer me away
| in real life.
|
| > A _hug_ is always nice, but a real, close, body-touching real
| life hug is ... nicer :)
|
| Is it? The two times I've been hugged in my life have been more
| just uncomfortable.
|
| > You can know for sure that people who are being nice to your
| face aren't simultaneously bitching behind your back
|
| ... my father was praised as being a good man. He was also the
| same man that grabbed by my hair and violently introduced my face
| to the kitchen floor. Broke my nose and lip, then made me clean
| the blood up with my tongue as apology to him for forcing him to
| hit me. He's flung coins into my face hard enough to cut the
| skin. Broken coffee mugs over my head.
|
| I don't blame him for doing what he did; I was difficult as a
| child. But it never really made any sense to me why his peers
| would praise him for being good when there was so much
| controversy over just spanking a child vs what happened to me
| when it seemed perfectly normal to me to get hit with a stick
| hard enough to bruise for a month afterwards.
|
| Always made me wonder what else someone would hide from
| strangers.
|
| > You can hear the warmth in the voice that says 'I love you' and
| see the look in the person's eyes
|
| ... This is something I've kind of wanted to rant about for a
| while. But no. I don't want love in my life. 25 years of my life
| were spent receiving bruises, cuts, and humiliation because my
| parents loved me. And I spent 25 years enduring it in silence
| because I loved them. Because that's what you're supposed to do
| when you love someone.
|
| They're gone now. And I've had more then enough love in my life
| to say that I want no part of it anymore.
|
| No, I think the quiet of an IRC screen is quite a quite a bit
| more preferable to outside.
| yakkomajuri wrote:
| Hey, I'm sorry you had to go through everything you've
| described here.
|
| I've never had to go through anything remotely similar.
|
| I'd just want to point out what you've experienced is not love.
| There may have been some form of love from those people towards
| you, but the things you've described are not manifestations of
| that love, they're manifestations of something else.
|
| I hope you can believe me. Sorry if I'm intruding.
|
| My email is on my bio if you ever want to chat in a non-public
| setting.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2026-01-13 23:00 UTC)