[neilv]

Agreed. Freenode was (and should still be, IMHO) the go-to real-time chat for open source projects.

I didn't realize how important at the time it was being founded. Rob Levin was an online acquaintance, and one day he started asking about how to fund an open source community service with donations. I was interested in open source and non-profits, so he and I talked a bit about that, but I didn't volunteer to help. Next thing I knew, he'd started Freenode, and projects flocked to it.