ICQ locking alternative clients out?

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Earlier on I was disconnected from ICQ (using Adium under Mac OS X) and couldn't reconnect. The Adium blog had this to say about the problem:

Many of you are reporting an error message that started appearing today:

The client version you are using is too old.

Please upgrade at http://pidgin.im/

First, about that website address: Adium uses libpurple, which is the core library from Pidgin. That?s why Pidgin?s address is in the message. We need to swap out that address for Adium?s address.

As for the rest of the error: It appears that, starting today, AOL?s servers now require ICQ 6 or later. Libpurple, in every recent version of Adium, promises to behave like ICQ 5. So, now, AOL?s server responds with ?ICQ 5, you say? You?re too old!? Libpurple receives this and passes it on to Adium, which displays it to you.

Once the Pidgin team (they maintain libpurple, remember) fixes this problem, we?ll bring the fix into Adium, and we?ll get it out to you in a new release as soon as we can.

Thanks for yourSourcer/"]Source[/url]

Apparently this affects all unofficial ICQ clients as well as the official client versions < 6. Way to go, AOL&Before anybody says 'Who uses ICQ these days?': It's still very popular here in Germany.here in Germany.

[PL_ Veteran]

What's the difference between ICQ and AIM?

[Minifig]

What's the difference between ICQ and AIM?

One isn't used and one's used. :rofl: .

In all seriousness.

I didn't know that people still used ICQ.

[buckaroo]

I would say ICQ is the number 1 IM-protocol in Germany (maybe even Europe?).

Miranda has no problems with the login and QIP got an update.

So it's not a big deal to avoid this check.

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

I would say ICQ is the number 1 IM-protocol in Germany (maybe even Europe?).

Miranda has no problems with the login an QIP got an update.

So it's not a big deal to avoid this check.

Hm? A friend of mine can't get Miranda to connect to ICQ at all. Weird.

For those on the Mac: iChat still works. Just add an AIM account and enter your ICQ UIN as screen name.

[tiagosilva29]

I would say ICQ is the number 1 IM-protocol in Germany (maybe even Europe?).

The number one protocol in Europe is the .NET Messenger Service (MSN), but everybody in Germany uses ICQ.

[The2]

Someone uses ICQ? Isn't that, like, 8 years ago?

[instant.human]

yeah right, virtually everyone here uses icq...

i dont even know why but well you go with the masses, more or less. i mean if everyone of your friends still uses icq because they dont know better, you are bound to have at least an icq account to reach someone.

while i always hated IM, i rather call someone, ftm. ;)

well, there is only one thing to do:

enjoy the summer holidays (for those who have them) and be patient. =)

[buckaroo]

The number one protocol in Europe is the .NET Messenger Service (MSN), but everybody in Germany uses ICQ.

Got any numbers?

Couldn't find a statistic or list about this.

[BrainDedd]

Miranda still logs into ICQ fine ...

[buckaroo]

Hm? A friend of mine can't get Miranda to connect to ICQ at all. Weird.

Just download an actual build (or even a nightly) and copy the icq.dll of the archive in your plugins directory.

[tiagosilva29]

Got any numbers?

Couldn't find a statistic or list about this.

Not really, I'm not a marketeer. My gf could have some stats on that, but I'm not sure...

This is from 2006, and even back then MSN was already beating the **** out of AOL/AIM.

[eilegz]

still ICQ its the best, sure no one use it, but its the only IM that feature file transfer resume, and many features like history and offline msg msn didnt have it until now while old icq have it long time ago. Icq its a pioneer in IM, too underrated, its only annoyance was the number but i still remember mine. Too bad my friends use the crappy msn i have no choice.

[Huleboeren]

yeah right, virtually everyone here uses icq...

i dont even know why but well you go with the masses, more or less. i mean if everyone of your friends still uses icq because they dont know better, you are bound to have at least an icq account to reach someone.

while i always hated IM, i rather call someone, ftm. ;)

well, there is only one thing to do:

enjoy the summer holidays (for those who have them) and be patient. =)

Ya, it is right..

Seriously, you germans need to move on :D

I was in this hostel lobby half a year ago and these germans next to me were using ICQ - I was like "NO WAI :o"

Only feature worth mentioning in ICQ was the where you could see what other person was typing in realtime - that was fun

[buckaroo]

This is from 2006, and even back then MSN was already beating the **** out of AOL/AIM.

Thanks a lot. Very interesting figures.

[buckaroo]

Ya, it is right..

Seriously, you germans need to move on :D

Why? I don't see any advantages of the other proprietary IM protocols.

Me and my friends just skipped all of them an moved over to Jabber/XAMPP.

But no one even mentioned MSN, AIM, YI, ...

[Punio4]

Finally.

Now perhaps 90% of my colleagues will dump trillan/pidgin/miranda ICQ, for the lack of a better client, and switch to MSN.

[buckaroo]

Finally.

Now perhaps 90% of my colleagues will dump trillan/pidgin/miranda ICQ, for the lack of a better client, and switch to MSN.

*g* Trillian, Pidgin and Miranda are not affected.

And those 3 are the "better client". They are multi clients. An Pidgin and Miranda are open source! So they are allready using the better one :)

If they want to, they can use these clients for MSN too.

[GEIST]

I noticed as well in Pidgin. I haven't actually used ICQ in years but dragged my account along anyways. I don't care if they lock out other clients for whatever reason. :p

[Rappy Veteran]

I still can't believe people use icq :p

[coth]

Someone uses ICQ? Isn't that, like, 8 years ago?

ICQ is still being used in Russia as MS still unsuccessfully pushing their services here.

QIP was unable to connect ICQ for a few hours as well. But a new version was quickly released for PC. QIP Infium logs into ICQ without problems.

[goatsniffer]

The headline might as well read "Future versions of windows will not support Tandy hardware."

ICQ is just awful.

[giga Veteran]

fixed: http://adiumx.com/blog/2008/07/adium-126-t...is-too-old-not/

[grimman]

Mm, ICQ ftw.

[Rudy]

i should try to remember my number/password to see if people on my list still go online