Sadly, after AOL IM, ICQ becuase infested with bots and scammers as well, so I abandoned it in 2002 I think. Unless they solve those problems, I don't think I will return to ICQ.... =/
AOL did destroy ICQ for benefit of their crappier AIM client when they bought them out. I tried to use ICQ years later and it just got worse and worse. I wouldn't say "commercialized" is the right word, more like AOLatized.
It's hard to take people seriously who still use AOL especially for business. I come across people fairly often who are using AOL accounts for their business email though.
I used to have a 5 or 6 digit number for my icq account, I downloaded that in late 1996 and can still recall the o ohhh message sound clearly in my mind as if I just heard it....
Those days were the golden days where eudora mail and netscape were going strong for the consumer/avid pc user....
Ahh, I really liked Eudora email. Such fond memories of those early years....we could go on and on couldn't we? It all seems like forever ago, never thought I'd be sentimental about software and hardware. Interesting.
AOL basically needs to become what it WAS back in the late 90s or throw in the white flag. Unfortunately, it has been destroyed by spammers. When I started using the internet back in 1997, I started with AOL, used its chat rooms and I felt safe. The rooms for the most part had moderators and there were convenient ways to contact admins when necessary. Oh, and Bebo profiles were a COMPLETE FAIL.
I actually use AIM to talk to my friends in eastern europe who all use ICQ... now am I going to have to get myself another ICQ account... I forgot my password ages and ages ago..
I used to love that it was directly connected so if I typed something..it would already be on the other screen b4 I hit send.
And the Annoying horn function where u could click it and and blast ur friends speakers with it. Then it changed and became another aol messanger
I remember downloading it (ICQ) once... Don't remember if I actually used it... I know my dad TRIED to, but it proved too cumbersome... AIM was King back then, until it got crappy, around the same time gmail chat came out. I have my AIM chat account tied into google, and that's that...