mostly (and still) on the un-encrypted IRC :D
No one seems to be chatting about anything, the only messages I see are logging people joining and leaving. One time I left an irc client open for hours and i finally saw some other human asked a question. After that , more nothing, I don't think anyone replied to them. These servers often show 100s or 1000s online too!
Am I doing something wrong, or am I missing something I need to use irc?
Checking my IRC client since yesterday, there's at least 500 new messages in almost all channels I've joined. Some more popular channels like #linux have constant conversations going.
I used to keep a few channels open at work all day long in 2007. #j2me, #java, #c. The conversation was active with no more than a few minutes of silence at a time. People would say good morning at the start of the day, goodbye at the end, they would talk about their weekend. It was like a virtual break room where you could ask tech questions (except #c was hostile to questions, those guys were weird) and make friendships.
It’s not just less active now. It’s dead every time I look.
I wouldn't call it dead at all.
I run a The Lounge[0] instance on a cheap VPS.
Honestly, I think things started declining when the original jjava bot got wiped :( RIP, jjava.
But yes, IRC channels in those days didn't take kindly to questions from people who didn't bother reading the docs, and imho that was a very good thing. Nobody properly learns by being spoonfed.
It's not dead. You're just in the wrong severs.
If you're in a channel at the same time as other people, it's fairly common for it to be active. Assuming interesting things to talk about. ;)
2. Most channels have a time of day when they're alive. That may not be when you're in them.
3. Turn off/Suppress the join/leave messages in busy channels. You'll be happier.