A short IRC primer

Have you ever wanted to talk with other computer users in other parts of the world ? Well guess what... You can ! The program is called IRC ( Internet Relay Chat) and it is networked much over North America, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. This program is a substitution for talk, and many other multiple talk programs you might have read about. When you are talking on IRC, everything you type will instantly be transmitted around the world to other users that might be watching their terminals at the time - they can then type something and respond to your messages - and vice versa. I should warn you that the program can be very addictive once you begin to make friends and contacts on IRC, especially when you learn how to discuss in 14 languages...

Topics of discussion on IRC are varied, just like the topics of Usenet newsgroups are varied. Technical and political discussions are popular, especially when world events are in progress. IRC is also a way to expand your horizons, as people from many countries and cultures are on, 24 hours a day. Most conversations are in English, but there are always channels in German, Japanese, French, Finnish, and occasionally other languages.

IRC gained international fame during the late Persian Gulf War, when updates from around the world came across the wire, and most people on IRC gathered on a single channel to hear these reports.