Also: XMPP.
Backlinks: XMPP.
Personal
IRC is the second way I learned to experience the internet, other than Netscape. Everybody used mIRC. There used to be thousands of people on the popular channels, there was always someone to talk to. That was before Yahoo Messenger.
IRC
IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging.
A few popular servers are: DALnet, EFNet, IRCnet, Libera.Chat, QuakeNet, Undernet, etc.
