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ICQ, One of the Oldest Instant Messengers, Is Shutting Down
(www.pcmag.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
The early version of what's now Microsoft's game suite in Windows was one of the coolest things I've seen on the Internet. It was a virtual gaming village where you could go sit at tables and play chess or checkers or cards with people from around the world. It worked 100% fine on 14.4k dialup.
Microsoft bought whatever that was and completely ruined it, just like they ruin everything else they buy.
That just reminded me of something I tried that was similar, I think it was called Visual Chat? It looked like a 2D cartoon, but each person controlled an avatar and could move around and talk to each other, go to other rooms, change expression, gesture, etc.
It's like the Midas touch: they make it shiny, expensive, and of little use.
You probably mean Comic Chat. It was actually just an IRC client, and I think it's still usable (but frustratingly ineffective) today. But there is a website where you can convert IRC logs to it, I think.
Yes, that's the one! Boy, it's been a long time.