I Want A UIN! (i dont want anymore.)

Awesome project! I don't speak Portuguese, so unfortunately most of your content on Youtube passes me by... but may I ask which server software you're using for your ICQ server? I've been thinking about running my own for a while now, but never quite managed to figure it out...

This is very cool, especially in light of ICQ shutting down: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/softwar … lmost-28-years/

I never used ICQ ("I Seek You") back in the day as I didn't know anybody who used it, but I remember downloading the client at least once just to check it out.

Which server are you using? Or is it your own server software?

Anyway, thanks for sharing your server info! Maybe I'll try connecting! I enjoy collecting software that works on each of my retro PCs (e.g. a version for 98, a version for XP, one for no SSE2, etc.) and I don't have any IRC clients yet, so now's the time and thanks for the version recommendations . 😀

caiot5 wrote on 2024-01-12, 14:59:

Hello guys, I'm not exactly new here but I have posted only a few times to the forum. I run a small Brazilian YT channel regard […]
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Hello guys, I'm not exactly new here but I have posted only a few times to the forum.
I run a small Brazilian YT channel regarding old hardware and about two years ago I started a project to run a classic ICQ server 24/7, compatible with the classic OSCAR protocol.
Well, it's been running for more than 500 days as of now and if anyone would like to connect to it for the nostalgia sake, you would just have to download a classic version of ICQ (I recommend 98a, 99a or 99b because it makes ease for you to change the server host) and then, if you're using 98a/99a/99b you should just click on "For admin use" and change login.icq.com to icq.byte5.com.br , then you're good to go. You can register like through the ICQ client you would normally do back then.
If someone would like a specific UIN (like the one you used to use at the time) please send me a PM and then I can create it for you.
P.S to Moderation: If it is not permitted to 'advertise' non-profit nostalgia here, I deeply apologize and you can, of course delete my post. I am just willing to share nostalgia with some other crazy folks like myself.

I’m interested in your project. Could you give me more details and maybe let me know the name of your YouTube channel so I can subscribe? You can reach me at chiamagianni@gmail.com.

I think I've subbed (CC) the most relevant content in the channel so you can try watching it this way.

As for the server, I've used iserverd as my starting point but it was a tough road since then. I spent some serious time trying to figure it out (even got in touch with the original author) and eventually managed to get a code that could run in a very specific environment. It's kinda frankie (and ugly) since it uses interpreters, containers, nat rules and etc to make everything work. This is why I didn't made any specific videos about it as I would need a lot of time to explain everything I did and in the end of the day it would not solve everybody's problems because most of it is system specific.

I'd rather recommend everyone wanting to host an instance of ICQ server for personal use to either use ICQ Groupware Server/Client which is VERY straightforward or to just connect to my project, it has been there for a while and my only goal is to give nostalgia to people like myself.
There's people around as well so you can still have a chat with some retro freaks like you used to do back then.

Recently I've fixed some things regarding V5 clients so if you were having issues with post ICQ-2000 versions you could try it again.

HerrK wrote on 2024-05-29, 17:34:

Awesome project! I don't speak Portuguese, so unfortunately most of your content on Youtube passes me by... but may I ask which server software you're using for your ICQ server? I've been thinking about running my own for a while now, but never quite managed to figure it out...

ramachjandra wrote on 2024-12-23, 12:24:

I’m interested in your project. Could you give me more details and maybe let me know the name of your YouTube channel so I can subscribe? You can reach me at chiamagianni@gmail.com.

I think you already found my channel 😉
But for everyone else's looking for the channel it is called Byte5 and it's easily reachable via www.byte5.com.br (it will redirect to the https://youtube.com/c/Byte5 )
All the videos are in Portuguese but I revised the closed caption of most of the content to make sure the subtitles are fine.
If you're having a hard time with any video that you'd like to watch, please let me know and I'll be glad to sub it for you.

This is a very interesting project @caiot5.
I remember I saw a couple of weeks ago, I don't know where, that people reverse engineering the MSN protocol and created their own server so people can use the old MSN to chat.
Congrats on the project.

I remember chats on ICQ. "ASL?" 🤣

Kahenraz wrote on 2025-01-03, 15:47:

I remember chats on ICQ. "ASL?" 🤣

Very common on AIM too! I miss the custom profile messages, animated buddy icons, and custom smiley face sets. Chats with your friends had a lot of personality. And of course, waiting for the "door opening" sound to see if your friend finally got on so you could chat with them, since messages wouldn't go through if they weren't online :D