[Hawkee]

I started an mIRC script site back in 1997. Young developers would email their scripts to me and I would write a very critical review of them. I did this for many months and the site quickly became one of the top IRC sites online. This momentum has carried the site all the way to 2013. While mIRC script traffic has steadily declined over the years there is still a strong community. We still have members posting mIRC snippets to this day. While I've been working hard to transition the site to more modern development platforms the mIRC posts keep coming. In fact I get a little embarrassed by all the mIRC content on the site. One thing I've noticed is that IRC is and always has been popular among very young developers. Many mIRC scripters are in their teens and some grow up to be professional developers. I've been watching them for 16 years and some come back and reminisce about their old IRC scripting days. IRC has been a major part of my life and has in many ways formed my entire development career.

[williamcotton]

Hey dude! You reviewed an mIRC script I wrote around 1997. It was called DynDNS and it was for updating your IP address with dyn.ml.org, that old service that would give dial up users with changing IP addresses a static DNS CNAME.

You liked it and gave it a positive review, and at 15, that was really huge for me and kept me hungry to keep coding.

So, thanks!

[Hawkee]

Wow, quite a testimony. Thank you! Is this it? http://www.hawkee.com/view.php?file_id=205

[williamcotton]

Yup, that's it! Haha, nice find.

[Hawkee]

That's a deprecated page. It says 2003 because I rewrote the site in PHP that year and had no dates associated with the scripts prior to that. The download link doesn't work anymore, but I probably still have the file on the server if you want it.

[ghc]

Your site is barely recognizable now, but thanks to the Wayback machine I remember it now. You're definitely on to something with regards to young developers. I started with IRC when I was about 12, and I still remember how magical it felt. In real life I was just a kid, but on IRC and Usenet I could discuss MTG deckbuilding strategy or C++ programming with adults and they wouldn't know how young I was.

And I think that's the draw...when you're young, bright, and ostracized by your peers for wanting to discuss "serious" topics like professional gaming strategy or programming, IRC is a panacea. You can chat with people who don't care about your age and will take you seriously as long as you're capable of intelligent discourse on the topics that interest you.

As I've grown older and formed a network of my peers, I've gradually stopped using IRC, but it will always hold a dear place in my heart because it gave me an outlet for my creativity and passion at a time in my childhood when there were no such outlets in the "real world".

[Hawkee]

Yes, and you've got such a captive audience with something like mIRC. Back in those days you could write a decent script and instantly get users. Today you've really got to do something special to stand out in the development community.

[ChiperSoft]

I first got into serious software development by way if writing Ircle scripts, which eventually led me into writing my own IRC client (AthenaIRC anyone?), so I concur with your assessment.