Now you may be thinking; “That chat program is still around?” or “What the heck is a eye-arr-see?”
Well let me tell you my friend. It stands for Internet Relay Chat and it’s been around for 34 years. It’s pretty much perfected at this point and quite easy to use if you have even the slightest technical knowledge.
So IRC servers are separate from one another with each server having it’s own admins. Each server you connect to has it’s own bots ran by individuals to messages and ask for things.
IRC servers work by sending slash commands much like discord does. To message another user you might type /msg coolboot2000 hello world! Piracy on IRC works by sending a bot a pm with the pack number you want.
“Where do I find servers and bots and pack numbers?” It’s as easy as using a xdcc search engine. http://sunxdcc.com/ has both a search and a list of networks. (DCC is Direct Client to Client meaning no files pass thru the server and XDCC is a version of DCC that allows large files to be transferred.)
“How do I connect?” You use an IRC client with SSL support. ~mIRC~ AdiIRC for windows and Hexchat with a patch for Linux. Once installed you can use the slash command /connect or use the clients GUI buttons to make a connection to the server.
“How do I make my own IRC client?” Follow the specifications here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_Relay_Chat_commands There are a ton of pre-made IRC libraries for pretty much every programming language.
Best luck friends!
edit: updated 11-6-23
I think this post should come with a huge disclaimer that IRC is highly addictive and a major time suck. If you’re trying to remain productive, avoid IRC.
SOURCE: I was on IRC all the way back to the 90s.
Got laid on IRC in 1993. Can recommend.
I put on my robe and wizard hat.
ASL?
2000 version:
16, M, actual location
2023 version:
Millennial, they/them, parents’ basement
really 😳
Yeah, I’m cis male and met an amazing woman… I don’t think it was a common experience.
Bringing me back to 1996 😆
Aye. I even went to a couple of meets (PS Screw you, Lorry).
So did I. Pub near the Cenotaph in London by any chance?
Im still on a couple ircds
I still am on IRC and can confirm.
To expand on this Have you considered Matrix? It’s like IRC but encrypted AND includes a bridge to IRC so you can have the best of both worlds. https://matrix.org/ The most popular client here https://element.io/ though there are many others.
@Tekchip @AndrewZen And the protocol is a million times more complicated and doesn’t always work reliably and requires a lot more server resources.
I have to agree. I love the idea of Matrix, but as someone who pushed his family to use it for the last two years, it is not reliable. Messages not going through, or going through but delayed, or having decryption errors. We moved away from it about two weeks ago due to important messages not making it through on many occasions and the confusion and frustration it’s caused.
I want to move over to it (in the medium-long term) but yes, there are a few deal breakers.
First, the clients are horribly resource hungry. If I open Element on my phone, it will keep synchonizing my messages for minutes until I can see any new messages, all the while CPU usage is through the roof.
Then, push notifications on my phone are not working even in the official client, Element.
But I’m aware of the pitfalls of how encryption work there, so I would just not bother using that feature for now. Like, if 2 if you start exchanging messages, and a 3rd family member joins, they will not see previous messages, even if you have set history visibility that way, and there is no solution whatsoever. This is because encryption keys that were used in the past are not sent to new participants.Currently we use Telegram, and there are disturbing changes lately, but that is at least performant, it works, and still much more trustable then facebook or google.
Speaking about notifications, did you check out your phone’s battery conserving settings? My friends having a Samsung or Xiaomi also have this issue due to aggressive restrictions on less-used apps. You can find more info and workarounds here: https://dontkillmyapp.com
Yes, but because of the resource usage of that app, I’m kind of reluctant to allow it to run more.
Also, I forgot to mention that I’m trying to use UnifiedPush (with ntfy) instead of google’s infrastructure. Sorry for that.
Server resources are not that high because of the protocol, but because it’s done in fucking Python, which is inherently inefficient.
Yes in any other language it will still need more resources than IRC, but not that amount as now, and I think the tradeoffs are worth it.An other thing is the resource usage of the clients.
Well yes if nearly all of the clients are made in web garbage then it’s no surprise they’ll be resource hungry.
But an other point that worsens the situation is that currently synchronization is done in a way that practically requires clients to keep all your joined rooms in memory. Change is on the way, fortunately, though.That’s why I’m glad Lemmy is written in Rust. I know that the instance admins are getting the most bang for their buck when they aren’t wasting CPU cycles on running an interpreter.
Sounds like a hard pass until these are resolved.
Okay, but I’ve been using it for my chat rooms for a year now and it works just as well as IRC. I don’t host the server so I don’t know how much more resources it takes, though
I hadn’t even heard of it. nice. How would I find a server to join? How can you search with it?
It’s what lemmy recommends for private messages since admins can see lemmy DMs. A lot of instances have matrix rooms too.
https://joinmatrix.org should have answers to most of your questions.
If you read the site carefully it will make you set up key backup, but please for the love of god, do set up key backup asap after registration! Without it, it is so easy to lose access to all your former encrypted messages, and you will be very disappointed when that happens.
There is the default matrix.org server you can join.
There are others out there as well. https://joinmatrix.org/servers
You can also create your own server if you’d like. Servers are federated, so you’ll be able to communicate with any/all of them (as long as you follow the rules of each one)
You can search for chat rooms in the app. You’ll easily find all the rooms hosted on your server, but you can also join chats on other servers.
How would you rate your experience pirating content with it?
Honestly, not sure how well the piracy experience is on Matrix. I’m not a pirate myself, but I imagine it would work fine if it was smaller files. You could make a separate thread per item.
There is probably an upload size limit on the server though. As far as I know, you can’t transfer files peer to peer.
do you know any matrix server related to piracy?
I can’t vouch for any since I have no skin in the game. I did a quick room search and found quite a few “piracy” rooms. No idea who or what is going on in each of them though.
Matrix is awful, sorry. I tried using it for like a year, but it kept randomly encrypting things and not letting ppl see messages, or worse, kicking them out of the chat
Matrix is not even close to IRC. What makes you think like that?
They are referring to using Matrix as a bridge to connect to IRC - not as a replacement - for the purpose of improving privacy.
/play hamster dance.wav
slaps you with a trout
/play hamster dance.wav
Since RARBG shut down, I been using IRC more often for 2160p releases that are tougher to come by. Also, I never stopped using it for chatting. You won’t ever catch me using that bloated Discord garbage.
Based. Haven’t ever used IRC tho. Zoom zoom here
I rarely use any kind of chat, but I used IRC sometimes back in the day. I was recently working on a thing where I needed to use Discord for some programming advice. I got the info I needed, but yeah that Discord is a convoluted mess. Newer hardly ever means better.
Could you tell a resourse for 2160p releases? Did not know IRC could be used also for such “big files”.
Seems like the recommended https://sunxdcc.com/ has some 2160p releases, though not anything that usenet or private trackers wouldn’t already have better versions of (from what I can tell).
My experience with IRC is that just like Reddit was, it is filled with entrenched mods and admins that act like petty kings and treat the channels/servers as their personal fiefdom. Some of these people have been mods and admins for like 15+ years. Incredibly cliquish and off putting, hostile to new users.
I think IRC could work but only if you create your own server and invite like minded people, and maybe rotate mods/admins regularly, lest the same thing happen to your server.
Takes about 10 mins to set up your own IRC server
so you can talk to yourself?
Think I replied to the wrong comment:/
But obviously no. It’s so you can create your own community with your own rules etc .
I am not important enough to have my own community following but I assume someone will have a use for it
Do you also rotate yourself out, then? Perhaps just symbolically with a hand picked temporary replacement?
Just buy a rotating chair.
I love IRC. Love its simplicity and instantaneous nature messages. Nothing feels as realtime chat like IRC does. It’s also dead simple to implement and self-host. Only downside is iffy file transfers which don’t work unless you have public IP. Inline images would be useful. Perhaps time is ripe for IRC+ protocol. Add few extensions and you are good.
IRC+ is called matrix, and it’s great. Has images and offline messages
Matrix is anything but great. Tried using it for months, forced my employees to use it for business communication. Worst decision I’ve made of late. Messages would get delayed or never arrive. Frequent issues with clients. Server drops. Etc. Gave up on it long time ago.
Ahh yes matrix, IRC with the extra bullshit layer.
IRC+
That’s called a MUD server. :P
A MUD is basically text based gaming. Nothing to do with the topic here
person I replied to got the joke.
MUD is more like IRC-
MUD is basically a talker with a game.
There’s nothing like IRC+… Maybe, but just maybe, XMPP?
Sorry, i didn’t get the joke.
No problem friend. Basically the joke was that instead of using matrix to send picture to each other you can use the ASCII art or simple image loaders in a mud client to share media.
http://www.medievia.com/connecting.html - the medievia client for instance has image and sound support.
How does this work compared to torrenting? Since it’s a direct peer to peer connection and not a pool, nobody except sender and receiver knows of this connection?
How is it secured? Basic TLS encryption?
The XDCC bots maintain a queue of recipients and transfer to each of them in turn (to avoid overwhelming the owner’s connection). They’re usually also capped on bandwidth. Each bot typically advertises its queue capacity, number of send slots and bandwidth.
And yes the connection is peer to peer (means you must have a connectable public port) and the transfer happens without going through the server.
Thank you!
Is there a way to find all of these IRC Channels/Servers that provide such functionality? I know that sunxdcc has a list of Networks, but i am wondering if there are more?
https://www.xdcc.eu/ is another search engine to try.
Mozilla Thunderbird can connect to IRC servers as a chat client. Just sayin’.
Edit: got downvoted for some reason, so clarified.
IRC really needs a discord styled client.
Something where if you drop an image or video onto it, it’ll automatically upload it to a private imgur link and share it.
If you want to share a larger file, maybe it uploads to wetransfer or something automatically.
Discord is basically IRC and more, but it’s also easier for non-techies to join a discord server, and you have a common identity across all servers.
The beauty of something open like IRC though is the fact that you can make and use any client you want, including an old C64 if you really wanted to… with additional adapters of course
IRC does have file transfer, was how all us cool kids back in the early to mid 90s shared stuff. Its just that sharing is either p2p or you need a bot to mimic p2e.
As for the images, part of the benefit of IRC is its so ridiculously simple that you barely need anything to do it. Yeah features can be added to apps but the payoff isn’t great. If you have the imgr app installed you already have quick image hosting. Tying apps to other services seems counter to how generic and open IRC is.
Yup, use to download all my anime through IRC when I was young 90s and baka torrents or similar. Good times.
mimic p2e.
What does p2e mean in this context? Tried looking it up but not finding anything that sounds right. I’d infer it may mean something similar to client-server, but I’m blanking on what the ‘e’ would stand for then.
Person to Everyone. In the context of this discussion i can post an image, video or file to a discord channel and everyone who goes in there can download it.
In IRC you make a client to client connection and send files directly to one another. You can setup a bot to respond to individual requests and transfer files but there is no “hey everyone download this”
Aaaah, thanks for clarifying! I’ve only dipped in & out of some IRC channels and used it very casually, so wasn’t familiar with the terminology.
The specific protocol for irc is called DCC (Direct Client to Client). It enables a lot of non-chat functionality, one of which is sending/receiving files.
Something where if you drop an image or video onto it, it’ll automatically upload it to a private imgur link and share it.
If there’s not a script out there that does something like this i’d be surprised. If not IRC daemons and clients are mostly open source.
I never found ways to pirate with discord. i’m sure there are but IRC is just so easy.
thelounge exists
I could never get into web based clients. Always seemed backwards to me to have a web browser as a dependency.
I definitely understand that.
I personally gave in because it made file uploading easy as well as the fact that thelounge also acts as a bouncer, keeping me online 24/7 even when my browser isn’t up.
Also, it’s not discord. :o
I was running a matrix -> irc bridge for a while and it would automatically upload and make small files available.
You brought back memories and I got interested. Interesting reading about privacy:
https://www.irchelp.org/security/privacy.html
How much of it is true?
all accurate.
I will say that a combination of…
- quassel (IRC connection mediator)
- quasseldroid (android client for quassel)
- TLS protected Tor hidden service connectins to your fav. IRC network
is an absolutely fantastic way to be always-on connected to IRC. turns it into a modern experience.
Thanks for the recommendations!
Never moved away from IRC even though most everyone else has; been a pirate’s invaluable friend for decades. Plus, y’know, still need it for every private tracker these days.
I’m aware of at least 1 or 2 private trackers using Discord, which is icky…
I’d argue that those are not places that are going to be around for any extended period of time.
/me remembers playing some pretty cool text games there, also trout slapping.
One of my earliest experiences online was on an irc server.
I was showing my mom how it worked and she pissed some other woman off on there. The lady told her she was going to hack her.
Well, she started sending a bunch of ascii text and my mom panicked and forced me to unplug the computer.
My mom said, “How long should we wait to connect to the internet? We probably need antivirus.” Haha
I felt like a goddamn explorer in those days.
Trout slapping is still a thing! There’s a Hexchat extension for that!
Where are the files ultimately hosted and who is paying for the bandwidth?
How do the servers avoid being taken down?
Where are the files ultimately hosted.
by the bots.
How do the servers avoid being taken down?
connections are Direct Client to Client. the server never sees any data. Same way google gets around linking to pirate sites. They don’t host any files themselves.
That’s not true. IRC is a client-server system. Your messages go to a server and are “relayed” to clients.
It’s not a p2p messaging system
DCC and XDCC are p2p. the /msg is relayed.
DCC = direct client-to-client. With IRC the server is not hosting or distributing any files it is making connections between clients similar to edonkey or soulseek just with a different protocol. Which means you connect directly with your IP to the client that has the files you want and the bandwidth is dependent on how fast each of the clients’ internet is.
Fun fact - some games also have integrated IRC clients!
Unreal Tournament 99 (and now Unreal 227) is one of them. Don’t seriously use it lol, it’s just funny how the internet worked back then to have that included in a game.
Unreal Tournament 99 (and now Unreal 227) is one of them. Don’t seriously use it lol, it’s just funny how the internet worked back then to have that included in a game.
But…You’re saying we could have an Unreal IRC client!? Who wouldn’t want an IRC client with a retro game attached? 😂
I mean, you can do it, like right now. It totally still works! Heck, there’s even Linux builds for 227 (Unreal) and 469 (UT) and Mac (469 only). It’s a bit rudimentary but it does the job.
irssi is the best chat client that has ever and will ever be created.
I coudn’t get SSL to work with it otherwise that’s what i’d be using.
Why because the server is using a self signed cert or something? Did you save it from the server and put it in the irssi trusted root store and define it in your config?
Honestly i didn’t know i needed to do those steps.
Yeah, it is confusing especially now that we are all used to HTTPS and automatic configs. If you can grab the self signed cert you can just save it to your irssi folder as a .crt and pop it in the config. I have this bookmarked from a while ago https://joshcurry.co.uk/posts/irssi-connect-to-a-server-which-uses-a-self-signed-certificate/
