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I miss AIM :(

MiddleEndian 5y ago
AIM gave me an unrealistic expectation of how easy it would be to chat with people with minimal interference (multi-chat XMPP clients like Adium/Pidgin that could handle AIM, MSN, Yahoo, and the earlier FB messenger and gchat, all at once with one UI were fantastic) and how easy it would be to send files to people (AIM had unlimited size file transfers, you could just send people files with zero hassle).
- mdavis6890 5y ago
  Chat apps are worse now than they were in the past. Aside from what you mention, I yearn for a desktop-native client, not browser based or Electron.
  - mixmastamyk 5y ago
    Pidgin still exists.
- adamrezich 5y ago
  I had completely forgotten about AIM's file transfers! an absolute godsend when making music and Flash videos with friends in middle school
robflynn 5y ago
Me too. I wouldn't be where I am today without it. That's such a strange thing to think about. I got on AIM right around the time it came out, so tail end of high school for me. I had been doing some programming, linux, script kiddy, basic web development stuff for a few years but nothing too serious. At some point I switched fully to Linux and couldn't use AIM anymore. I found gaim which was AIM-only at the time. I installed that and began using it and eventually ran into some bugs or missing features and decided to begin contributing. This eventually led to me becoming an official part of the gaim team and, eventually, moving across the country to work and live together at a start-up in Southern California (they hired the team, as well as the lead developer from competing/friend project Everybuddy). I eventually became lead developer of the project and continued to build out features and a development team. Managing/maintaining a popular open source project was such an impactful moment on my life, especially coming from a small rural town where I never really thought about things like that. I ended up retiring from the project around the time the naming dispute was happening and the project was becoming Pidgin due, well, due to a few things, mostly burn out and some personal life issues, but was with the project in some fashion for about 9-10 years. Going to linux shows, doing a few interviews, working with and living with my friends, playing with linux / open source software all the time, having gaim-dev meetups, getting paid to do what I love... I was thinking about this a few weeks ago, but that timespan is my fondest. I have so many great memories from then and I wouldn't trade it for anything. All that because of a chat program.
- yuppie_scum 5y ago
  Pidgin was a pretty cool way to keep various chats integrated, I suppose that option is just gone these days. Thanks for your work on that.

I miss AIM :(

AIM gave me an unrealistic expectation of how easy it would be to chat with people with minimal interference (multi-chat XMPP clients like Adium/Pidgin that could handle AIM, MSN, Yahoo, and the earlier FB messenger and gchat, all at once with one UI were fantastic) and how easy it would be to send files to people (AIM had unlimited size file transfers, you could just send people files with zero hassle).

mdavis6890 5y ago
Chat apps are worse now than they were in the past. Aside from what you mention, I yearn for a desktop-native client, not browser based or Electron.
- mixmastamyk 5y ago
  Pidgin still exists.
adamrezich 5y ago
I had completely forgotten about AIM's file transfers! an absolute godsend when making music and Flash videos with friends in middle school

robflynn 5y ago

Me too. I wouldn't be where I am today without it. That's such a strange thing to think about. I got on AIM right around the time it came out, so tail end of high school for me. I had been doing some programming, linux, script kiddy, basic web development stuff for a few years but nothing too serious. At some point I switched fully to Linux and couldn't use AIM anymore. I found gaim which was AIM-only at the time. I installed that and began using it and eventually ran into some bugs or missing features and decided to begin contributing. This eventually led to me becoming an official part of the gaim team and, eventually, moving across the country to work and live together at a start-up in Southern California (they hired the team, as well as the lead developer from competing/friend project Everybuddy). I eventually became lead developer of the project and continued to build out features and a development team. Managing/maintaining a popular open source project was such an impactful moment on my life, especially coming from a small rural town where I never really thought about things like that. I ended up retiring from the project around the time the naming dispute was happening and the project was becoming Pidgin due, well, due to a few things, mostly burn out and some personal life issues, but was with the project in some fashion for about 9-10 years. Going to linux shows, doing a few interviews, working with and living with my friends, playing with linux / open source software all the time, having gaim-dev meetups, getting paid to do what I love... I was thinking about this a few weeks ago, but that timespan is my fondest. I have so many great memories from then and I wouldn't trade it for anything. All that because of a chat program.

yuppie_scum 5y ago
Pidgin was a pretty cool way to keep various chats integrated, I suppose that option is just gone these days. Thanks for your work on that.