Freenode, the WMF's favorite IRC system, is sold off

[ericbarbour]

Some of Freenode's longtime geek users are REALLY pissed now:
https://www.devever.net/~hl/freenode_suicide

And some of them won't give it up:
http://techrights.org/2021/06/04/irc-control/

I would mutter something about nerd-libertarians but why bother--one common "feature" of all IRC networks in recent years has been paranoid conspiracy-theorizing by techheads. They are STILL using IRC to pass around ravings about reptile aliens, illuminati, Covid being a bioweapon/vaccination thing/etc, and the like. Unlike Facebook or Twitter: on IRC they can be as insane as they want. Becuase no one else will see their ravings.

[ericbarbour]

and so it goes

https://linux.chat/linux-on-freenode/
https://nedbatchelder.com/blog/202106/g ... enode.html
https://tech.slashdot.org/story/21/06/1 ... t-channels
https://ariadne.space/2021/06/14/the-end-of-freenode/

https://isfreenodedeadyet.com/

[sammywalker]

That global user count graph on isfreenodedeadyet. Ouch.