AOL's AIM Instant Messenger Going Away

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
Staff member
Joined
May 18, 1997
Messages
55,728
How many of your guys are still using AIM? If so, it seems that you will soon have to pick something else for your instant message needs....after 20 years, because AOL is shutting AIM down. Your @AIM.com email address will continue to work however. Here at HardOCP we all use Hangouts to keep in touch. Thanks cageymaru...via Hangouts.

AIM will be discontinued on December 15, 2017. AIM will continue to work until the morning December 15, 2017. After this date, you will no longer be able to access or sign in to AIM services on any platform.
 
21b.jpg
 
Shame. AOL was my first ISP via dialup back in the day and I still have people on my buddy list from back then. I used to run AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, MSN, and XFire, all as separate messenger clients, then together via Gaim/Pidgin. So far AIM and ICQ were the only ones that had not shut down yet.

I am curious how this affects ICQ accounts. AOL bought ICQ back in 1998 and eventually merged the two messenger networks. In 2010 AOL sold ICQ to another company called Digital Sky Technologies, but the two networks have remain linked. Curious how that will work out. ICQ has remained very popular in Russian speaking countries over the years.

I wish it was easier to send SMS/Text from my computer (directly) similar to these old messenger networks without having to use a gimmicky app on my phone as a relay or similar.
 
  • Like
Reactions: PeaKr
like this
The end of a childhood era. I kept in touch with so many old buddies from MMOs and forums from 1999-2006. I logged on for the first time in 10 years a few months ago and my contact list is a graveyard.
 
To be honest I didn't know it was still around. I don't use a desktop instant messenger anymore. The closed thing i used was hangouts but don't even use that anymore.
Brings back memories of my junior high / high school days......I used to use all of the IMers......phone text messaging has pretty much taken over for me.
 
Wow. back when it was incredibly useful (and oh yeah! ICQ! many hours on that playing while playing Everquest lol). I guess for gaming now... I just use Steams chat thing.
 
I am still using AIM to this day! I keep in touch with a bunch of folks; we all worked for Earthlink in the late 90's, early 2k and just kept using it.

As a bit of nerd trivia, I have a Win3.11 VM with TCP/IP installed and AIM is one of the few Internet apps/services that still works perfectly to this day (along with FTP, Telnet and all the timeless classics).
 
I remember using all of the chat services like that. AIM, yahoo, ICQ, MSN... wow. I remember getting grounded because I downloaded and used a "punter" program on AIM to mess with my friends. My dad found the file on the hard drive and did his research on what I was doing and that was that. Remember that program "Trillian" that would let you log into all of the services with one app? Ahhhh those were the days.
 
I didn't use it much but I think it was a representation although funny of everything that was wrong with and continues to be wrong with communication in the computing world.

Namely why cant communication all be more like email where its a universal protocol that everyone develops clients for. AIM vs ICQ was one ugly duopoly. But hey at least back then we had universal messaging clients spring up like Trillian, etc.... Now days its just a freaking mess. I have 1 person on Line, bunch on facebook, cant even use imessage cause I don't use an iPhone etc.....Googles got what like 4 themselves. Maybe if we are really lucky some headway will be made here with RCS, judging by history probably not. And even if it does work what about people that don't have phone numbers?

RIP AIM but your legacy lives on in facebook, imessage, hangouts and a million other proprietary messengers.
 
  • Like
Reactions: kohl
like this
theplaidfad said:
I remember using all of the chat services like that. AIM, yahoo, ICQ, MSN... wow. I remember getting grounded because I downloaded and used a "punter" program on AIM to mess with my friends. My dad found the file on the hard drive and did his research on what I was doing and that was that. Remember that program "Trillian" that would let you log into all of the services with one app? Ahhhh those were the days.
Click to expand...
Once ICQ went away, I used nothing but trillian directly.
 
Good ole America Offline joke never gets old.
 
Last edited:
i realized i stop using im programs for normal uses. I just send text messages on phone contacts, for other stuff it is like using:
mattermost, slack, steam, blizzard app
 
I haven't used Instant Messaging outside of work for the past few years. I remember when it was "the thing to do". Remember when it was cool to have a low ICQ number? Mine was 6442906, but I completely shut down that account a few years ago because nobody else was using it anymore. Just this past week, I completely removed my Trillian account and my AIM account.... again, nobody was using it.

At the rate we're going, the 1998 movie You've Got Mail is going to require a primer for understanding.
 
WOW good bye old friend. Best way to communicate in the Late 90's and early 00's with friends that went off to other colleges.
 
Sigh... that screenname i chose when I was 15 will haunt me forever.....
 
Honestly AIM was a missed opportunity. I was surprised to find that AIM didn't even exist on the app store. No wonder it died. Everyone left the platform and most people use FB messenger, hangouts, discord, etc.
 
ZLoth said:
I haven't used Instant Messaging outside of work for the past few years. I remember when it was "the thing to do". Remember when it was cool to have a low ICQ number? Mine was 6442906, but I completely shut down that account a few years ago because nobody else was using it anymore. Just this past week, I completely removed my Trillian account and my AIM account.... again, nobody was using it.

At the rate we're going, the 1998 movie You've Got Mail is going to require a primer for understanding.
Click to expand...

I had a 6 digit ICQ number. I remember at one point they were selling for a few hundred dollars on ebay and I couldn't remember my password. I was so bummed out. Spent days trying to figure it out.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top