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This doesn't kill IRC. The name isn't important. It's just a brand. If the Freenode volunteers and users move to Libera Chat, then Libera Chat becomes the ne

by RIMR 5y ago

This doesn't kill IRC. The name isn't important. It's just a brand. If the Freenode volunteers and users move to Libera Chat, then Libera Chat becomes the new Freenode. Oracle didn't kill Continuous Integration when they bought and destroyed the Hudson project. All the volunteers moved to the forked Jenkins project, the users followed. Jenkins is now the new Hudson. Like Oracle, Andrew and Co. will end up holding the bag on a dead brand as the project moves elsewhere.

rocqua 5y ago
Point made was that there are succesful competing alternatives in slack and discord. Hence any damage to existing IRC communities is likely to see some users move towards IRC competitors, rather than another IRC server.
HajiraSifre 5y ago
> This doesn't kill IRC. The name isn't important. It's just a brand. Sure, but it will still negatively affect the number of users. For example, I'm already aware of one community that decided to end their IRC presence altogether (and only keep their discord) rather than migrate their freenode channel to another network. There will undoubtedly also be a number of individuals who decide to just quit IRC instead of moving.
myself248 5y ago
And I've heard of Jenkins, I've never heard of Hudson. So that's something. How long was Hudson dominant for? Freenode has been the go-to name for IRC (in FOSS circles) for two decades plus. There's also OFTC which I don't know the whole story of, and there are some projects making their home on Efnet and elsewhere too, but the majority of everything has been on Freenode. To the point that I don't even /list anymore, I just blindly /join #name_of_project and almost always land somewhere useful. This kills that. Some projects won't stay on Freenode and will move to Libera. Some projects won't stay on Freenode and will move to OFTC. Some projects will stay on Freenode. It fragments an ecosystem that was useful primarily because it was so universal, and the value of that universality is not conserved through fragmentation. I wish I understood the complaint better, so I could make a better argument for projects to move, and hopefully restore some of that universality elsewhere. But as it is, I simply can't make sense of the complaints without a lot of backstory I don't apparently have. For all the volunteers to walk out, there must be something there, I just don't grok it.

by RIMR 5y ago

rocqua 5y ago

Point made was that there are succesful competing alternatives in slack and discord. Hence any damage to existing IRC communities is likely to see some users move towards IRC competitors, rather than another IRC server.

HajiraSifre 5y ago

> This doesn't kill IRC. The name isn't important. It's just a brand. Sure, but it will still negatively affect the number of users. For example, I'm already aware of one community that decided to end their IRC presence altogether (and only keep their discord) rather than migrate their freenode channel to another network. There will undoubtedly also be a number of individuals who decide to just quit IRC instead of moving.

myself248 5y ago

And I've heard of Jenkins, I've never heard of Hudson. So that's something. How long was Hudson dominant for? Freenode has been the go-to name for IRC (in FOSS circles) for two decades plus. There's also OFTC which I don't know the whole story of, and there are some projects making their home on Efnet and elsewhere too, but the majority of everything has been on Freenode. To the point that I don't even /list anymore, I just blindly /join #name_of_project and almost always land somewhere useful. This kills that. Some projects won't stay on Freenode and will move to Libera. Some projects won't stay on Freenode and will move to OFTC. Some projects will stay on Freenode. It fragments an ecosystem that was useful primarily because it was so universal, and the value of that universality is not conserved through fragmentation. I wish I understood the complaint better, so I could make a better argument for projects to move, and hopefully restore some of that universality elsewhere. But as it is, I simply can't make sense of the complaints without a lot of backstory I don't apparently have. For all the volunteers to walk out, there must be something there, I just don't grok it.