Do a substantial number of IRC users actually care that the current version of IRC lacks the features that IRCv3 proposes, or are we just modernizing because we want to make writing IRC bots more complicated?
IRCv3 makes writing software easier not more complicated.
Take the "away-notify" extension for example. Without it you would have to repeatedly poll a channel with WHO to see if all users in that channel have marked themselves as away.
Take the "away-notify" extension for example. Without it you would have to repeatedly poll a channel with WHO to see if all users in that channel have marked themselves as away.