Recently from a post on HabrΓ© I that in the ICQ messenger they are massively deleting old inactive accounts. I decided to check two of my accounts, to which I connected relatively recently - at the beginning of 2018 - and yes, they were also deleted. When trying to connect or log into an account on a site with a known correct password, I received a response that the password was incorrect. It turns out that I no longer have "ICQ". It seems to be no problem, but the feeling is unusual: I had it for more than 20 years, but now I donβt. I am a collector of retro technologies, but I do not consider myself an activist, a supporter of the preservation of eternal values, a fighter for everything old and good. Everything in this world is changing, and there is nothing to mourn for gray hair, much less for the sequence of seven or nine numbers that was once proudly printed on my business card.
But there is a reason to sum up. ICQ lives, but I'm no longer there, which means you can tell the whole story of the "me and ICQ" format from beginning to end. This post is in the name of nostalgia, in my terms - sobbing, but not only. In a very limited way, I restored the experience of twenty years ago, when at the turn of the century ICQ was the number one messenger. I listened to those very sounds, sent a couple of messages to myself. I won't say that nowadays ICQ is "not a cake": in the end, this service has successfully outlived its competitors (AOL Instant Messenger, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger). 15-20 years ago, almost all the features of modern network communication tools were implemented in ICQ, but it happened too early. We'll talk about this.
The diary of a collector of old pieces of iron I keep in .
The earliest in the web archive The site ICQ.com is dated April 1997, and then the domain belonged to a completely different organization - some kind of association of manufacturers and users of measuring equipment. IN there is already the same ICQ, in the recognizable style of "early web primitivism."
Version of the program for Windows 95/NTβv98a, and I definitely didn't live there. The website has complex instructions, offering two distributions to choose fromβone includes the heavy Mfc42 DLL, apparently necessary for running software compiled for Microsoft Visual Studio. This is useful information: my memories of those times are unreliable, especially when it comes to correctly dating events. I definitely already had an ICQ account by 1999. At the time, I was studying in the US and used ICQ sporadically; email and Fidonet were the primary means of electronic communication back then. ICQ allows for real-time messaging, which requires regular internet access. I had it back thenβunlimited dial-up for $30 a monthβbut those I wanted to chat with connected at best once a week, sometimes from my mother's work, sometimes from school, sometimes from early internet cafes. The internet's inaccessibility to the masses and the time difference were obstacles, but when everything clicked, it was amazing. The first experiences with online interactionβICQ or Krovatka chats, radio streamingβwere the future, now a harsh reality. One minute you were delivering an envelope with a handwritten letter to the post office, which would take two weeks to reach its destination. And the next, you were communicating with someone thousands of kilometers away as if they were sitting next door.
In early 1999, the ICQ website looks like . There are attempts to build your own Internet with poetesses around a simple service: here you have hosting web pages, games and some kind of βsinging boardsβ. Service Description: ICQ is a revolutionary, web-friendly tool that tells you which of your friends are online and allows you to contact them at any time. No more searching for your friends and colleagues every time you need to chat with them.
That is: ICQ has a list of contacts to which you add people. For each contact, you can see if he is online and chat with him. The list of contacts will be transferred to the server a little later, which will simplify the problem of accessing the account from different computers. ICQ is not a pioneer of real-time communication on the Internet, but the company managed to "package" the service in a form that is understandable and convenient for the average user. So successful that in 1998 the Israeli startup Mirabilis was bought by the America Online holding, at that time a giant of the network business. AOL grew on the back of the dot-com boom, so much so that in 2000 it took over traditional media conglomerate Time Warner for $165 billion. For ICQ, they paid more modest, but still insane money for those times: $ 287 million immediately and another 120 million a little later.
year 2000. Hostel, ten-megabit local area and constant access to the Internet at the speed "as lucky". ICQ is a regular means of communication, along with strange discussions in text files shared on students' computers. Hijacking "ICQ" is a common thing: communication with the server is not encrypted and passwords are easily intercepted by tech-savvy neighbors. The ICQ user directory is a prototype of a social network, you can find a random person and chat. To do this, the βReady to chatβ setting appears in the client. The computer is one for four, you need to carefully separate accounts so as not to break something.
2001, first job. ICQ is a corporate messenger, the prototype of "slack" or "discord", only without chat rooms, all communication is strictly one-on-one. If you want to add someone to the copy, copy and forward the message. The contact list includes colleagues and superiors. The bosses call on the carpet with guiding messages, trips there are discussed with colleagues (the main thing is not to confuse what and to whom to send).
The history is laconic: smoke breaks, discussion of work issues, exchange of discs with music, an invitation to watch the latest version of Masyanya. The client software is official, but alternatives are periodically evaluated - either a certain Trillian, or early versions of Miranda IM.
2003. Rented apartment, dial-up again, but sometimes using GPRS mobile phone service. First attempts at mobile chat: usually using a mobile phone and a PDA. Windows Mobile or Palm OS. The experience is inspiring, but impractical: staying connected all the time is expensive and difficult, and the devices' batteries aren't designed for 24/7 connectivity. After version 2001b, ICQ 2003 and ICQ Lite were releasedβI use the latter, but I'm gradually switching to the alternative client Miranda IM. There are two reasons for this: the feature-packed official ICQ became heavier (which they tried to address with the Lite version), and the client also introduced banner ads. I struggled with them not so much because I disliked banners, but because of the meager bandwidth of my modem connection. ICQ, in turn, struggled with ad-free alternative clients, periodically changing its protocol.
Until 2005-2006, absolutely all online communication takes place in ICQ. Communication with colleagues, personal life, intimate conversations, buying and selling. ICQ's 2005 fashion site begins with an Adobe Flash video. ICQ 5 is the last official client that I used: it is installed in case of problems with alternative software. I use an alternative client also because of the multi-platform. In the middle of the XNUMXs, ICQ competitors began to appear in batches. Part of the communication moved to the Google Talk service, as it not only saved the message history on the server, but was also built into the GMail mail interface. Studying the features of the official ICQ client, I understand that the transition was not made then because there was nothing in ICQ. And not because of the integration of Google chat with other services of the company. Rather, the reason was that Google Talk is a new phenomenon, and ICQ is not so much anymore. "ICQ" in attempts to monetize everything and everyone seemed to be an overloaded monster, GTalk - an easy and convenient service "strictly on the case."
Similar stages of development in the second half of the decade went through the alternative messenger QIP. At first it was a convenient replacement for the official ICQ client with a very similar interface, but gradually acquiring features (its own messaging protocol, photo hosting, forced browser integration).
It is normal to monetize software and users, but in the case of ICQ and QIP, I stubbornly did not want to monetize. Later, the same story happened with Skype: it was actively used for voice communication, but over time it became heavy and inconvenient compared to competitors, without offering any unique features. In 2008, I finally switched to the messenger , the project is open, without advertising, convenient and minimalistic, allowing you to connect subscribers from ICQ, Google Talk, Facebook and Vkontakte instant messengers, etc. in one window.
In 2010, I add a new contact to ICQ for the last time - my future wife. However, on "ICQ" we almost do not communicate. In general, in the early 2010s, there is some kind of IM-timelessness: I donβt remember preferring any one chat service. My attention is roughly equally divided between ICQ (less and less), Skype, Google Talk, SMS, messages on Facebook and VK. It could be assumed that the platform will win in the end - where the user simultaneously receives a lot of services - and mail, and social networks, and shopping and "stories", and the devil knows what else. It seemed that βchatβ had become a harsh reality, that nothing new could be invented there.
It seemed! In 2013-2014, I finally found myself in an βalways onlineβ situation. At the end of the 2010s, the batteries of the devices did not allow doing this, later - the unreliable coverage of the cellular network. By the mid-4s, smartphones could already work for a day without turning off data transfer, and cellular communications were also pulled up with the widespread introduction of 18G base stations. The concept of a permanent internet connection is finally a reality for most people, at least in cities, 2003 years after ICQ, a service that initially works best in this scenario. But in terms of the number of users and consumer attention, the winners were neither ICQ nor Facebook and Google, but the independent services Whatsapp (later became part of Facebook), Telegram and the like. A high-quality mobile application helped (and not screwed somewhere on the side to the desktop one), the idea of βββchannelsβ in Telegram, collective communication, seamless sending of pictures, video and music, sound and video communication. All this was in ICQ (except for channels) already in XNUMX, albeit in a limited form! The most successful technologies are those that appear on time. All the rest, sooner or later, come to me under the heading "Antiquities".
The most important artifact of my βICQ eraβ is the archive of the Miranda IM messenger, more precisely, a portable distribution kit for a program with a message database. I wrote about him in 2002 programs: this monument to bygone times was squeezed into a collection of software distributions. Later, I found another copy of Miranda from 2005, and it turns out I have an archive of about four years of ICQ conversations during the messenger's golden age. I can't read these logs for long because I can't resist facepalming. Now, in March 2020, the coronavirus has become the main topic, and they say it's not recommended to touch your face. So I won't. The screenshot above is the same Miranda IM from the archive. It still runs, even under Windows 10, although it looks a little odd on a 4K display and has encoding issues. To preserve the privacy of the contacts in my contact list, I renamed them according to what I remember, and that's what I ended up with. It's a snapshot of my online life from about 15 years ago.
And here is the end of the story. In 2018 I am setting up a retro laptop I'll bet Windows XP, a couple of retro games, WinAMP media player. I'm also setting up Pidgin, which I haven't used for a while, and adding two of my ICQ accounts, unaware that I'm logging into them for the last time. Out of 70 contacts, only one is online, and it seems they've forgotten they have a client running somewhere, not responding. As of March 2020, Pidgin won't connect anymoreβthe server returns an "incorrect password" message, even though the password is definitely correct. The same thing happens when trying to log into my ICQ account on the website. The "recover password" option also doesn't workβneither email nor mobile phone number are listed in the credentials. The era of ICQ for this particular household is over.
Even if you have an account, old ICQ clients will not work, just like old email programs or browsers. This software depends on changes in the network service, and at least it will break on encryption of communications - at the beginning of the 2001s it was not there, now it is a necessary requirement for any data transfer on the Internet. You can take a retro computer and install ICQ 1999b, but you won't get past the UIN and password screen. But there is an alternative: ICQ Groupware Server, an early (XNUMX) attempt by the company to bring the messenger into the corporate space, most likely too early. The server allows you to create your own personal network based on the "secure" protocol, and give yourself a cool four-digit number!
"Consumer" versions of ICQ can't work with Groupware Server (or at least I couldn't), so you need a special corporate client. Theoretically, it's compatible with regular clients. Linux-server , domestic development and the result of reverse engineering of a proprietary protocol. Luckily, the archive of the early ICQ ftp server was preserved in the web archive, and I didn't have to look for official distributions in the dark corners of the Internet. Here There is useful information about the work of this software.
The client interface is very similar to the standard ICQ version 99b. This is the very beginning of ICQ's life, completely minimalist, both in functionality and design. I ran the server on the same ThinkPad T43 running Windows XP, although it would be correct to use Windows NT4. The client software was installed on Ρ Windows 98.
Works! Most of all, I was surprised by the lack of a dialogue mode in this client: messages are sent and received as e-mail - you need to click Reply and only then you can enter text. There is also a βdialogueβ in this version, but separately: there, apparently, there is a direct connection between clients and then you can enter text in real time - in different windows for the sender and recipient. Here it is, the dawn of instant communications.
I will end this text with a video demonstration. It had to be done, not so much because of the video, but because of the sounds accompanying the work of the client. Once the standard background of our existence, they are now part of history. It's not that ICQ has changed and I no longer have an account there. We ourselves have also changed. This is normal, but for some reason I sometimes like to call out of oblivion such ghosts from the past, historical software on ancient hardware. And remember.
Source: habr.com
