[cdcarter]

One of the weirdest hold outs of IRC I know about is the collegiate academic competition (or quizbowl) community. Serious quizbowlers across the country still hang out in #quizbowl on Freenode every day, shooting the shit, discussing a novel or philosophical treatise, discussing tournament shortcomings, or just playing a round of the game, shoehorned into the IRC ecosystem. There's a great moment when you think that you buzzed in first, but really a netsplit is about to occur, and the moderator never even noticed you trying!