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EFnet Hits Turbulence
Lots of submissions regarding a bumpy week for EFnet, mostly short on fact and long on rumor. Several high-capacity servers have either dropped off entirely or limited their connections to local clients due to DOS attacks. We got one good link about the situation; anyone else have more info? Is this a real problem or just normal roughness? I'm not an IRC regular these days but I've never seen a stable IRC network.
On of the biggest problems with EFNet, has been that there is no 'ownership' of channels - or the fact that no ircops participate in such matters. This is has made it a very interesting for screept (yeah)-kiddies to attack, since they then can annoy the most people by attacking something (that in fact) isn't that useful. There's no surprise in the fact that the number of servers has dropped from 140+ (?) to the 35 servers connected at the moment. Large ISPs will never risk their serious business for something as 'non-profitable' as an IRC-server. Sorrowly, this is becoming more and more of the truth - but hopefully EFNet will survive for a long, long time.
.. p4ck37 j00 b417ch. yeah. auch. it hurts.
mats
One man's ceiling is another man's floor.
Note that this is just one aspect of recent EFnet suckage
--
Brian Fundakowski Feldman
I remember when blackened.org went offline because of DoS attacks. They had the ability to serve up to 7000 IRC clients. One of the main reasons for killing the server, IIRC, was because of an evening where a bunch of idiots threw tons of garbage down blackened's pipes, causing the entire state of (arizona?) to be deprived of internet access. Although I cannot find Matt's original letter, I did find the config of irc2.blackened.com:
oldcharred.blackened.com: AMD K6-2 @ 333mhz, 128M of ram, 18G-10k rpm scsi primary, 9G secondary. This server houses the origional irc2.blackened.com EFnet server, the largest EFnet server in the world before it de-linked. Still running with the origional IRCD, I, O, C/N lines and TCM.
It's a pity that, in blackened's case, volunteer workers such as mjr are forced to abandon what they love to do, because of immature kiddies flooding the network with useless garbage.
Disclaimer: I'm fairly new to the efnet experience. I've been running Undernet servers[1] for the past two years and only recently linked a server to efnet[2].
I haven't yet found someone who has been able to figure out where these rumours have been coming from. We got a couple enquiries about "is efnet going to shut down" in our efnet mailbox, but that's nothing out of the ordinary (Imminent Death of Efnet Predicted - Film at 11). Haven't seen any mail claiming that anything really special is going on. A couple of servers changed their policy. As far as I understand, from my limited experience, there's nothing strange or extraordinary about that. IRC networks are dynamic in nature.
The amount of DoS-flooding that goes on directed at a typical server for a major IRC network is completely out of bounds. Scriptkiddies see themselves as Freedom Fighters and Mighty Warriors, but are slowly pushing IRC networks to the point where they either become unusable or virtual Police States. On some networks, ideas have already been coined to start using a mandatory user registration system. No admin likes the privacy implications of such a move, but it may turn out to be the only way to keep the idiots out.
Once in a while, we get lucky and one of these kids touches a site that a federal agency cares enough about to start a case and the world has to deal with one scriptkiddie less. Most of them never get caught, though.
HTH.Pi
[1] saltlake.ut.us.undernet.org and haarlem.nl.eu.undernet.org
[2] efnet.vuurwerk.nl
Wow. In my editorials I often cite IRC as an alternate distribution method for warez and porn, a wake-up call to legislators who believe the Internet is controllable by legislation. De-centralization puts it just beyond arm's reach and even if they could target every server being used, it would be a futile exercise as a copycat protocols spring up. That said, I've also sat in on some great chats between sufferers of Parkinsons disease living on different continents. Sometimes they chat about their disease, sometimes about fishing, and occasionally argue passionately about Ford vs. Chevy. Alcoholics can find support in channels devoted to that purpose. People living in central and western Canada can't see TV coverage of election results until their polls close. Hop on to a channel for maritimers and get real-time results -- a must for us political junkies, debating the results as they come in, of course There's always a user in one of the technical channels willing to help a clueless computer user figure out why their browser won't display Quicktime content. Amateur HTML users can get help with that damned tag that won't work, in real time. Film reviews are unfiltered as people discuss their entertainment choices. The IRC is a microcosm of the world -- though with better communication. I've chatted with people living in repressed countries who dare to talk openly in channel about conditions where they live. When IRC becomes easier to use, and more stable, it will be almost as important as email. Studying journalism in school, I've spent hours chatting with classmates in the wee hours as we worked on the school paper on deadline, DCC'ing draft pages back and forth. That's a powerful tool. IRC has its downside, but to pooh-pooh it as exclusively the domain of the seediest 'netizens is knee-jerk reactionism. Kiddie porn is illegal, and there are legal recourses which exist today to punish those trading in it, no matter how they do so. It's not reason enough to advocate the shutdown of the world's electronic meeting place.
> , and all of the other IRC networks,
Getting a bit general aren't we?
Have you ever visited irc.openprojects.net for example?
- Lots of useful discussion regarding development etc.
- Frequent conferences held discussing the direction of open source projects
- Much much more. There's even a #slashdot channel. The one single file I have seen on this irc network for offer over dcc is a linux kernel patch in #kernelnewbies. That's hardly what I would call illegal or immoral.
I would also add that there are similar channels on #efnet. Just because there are a lot of bad goings on is not a reason to punish the legitimate users by getting rid of the networks.
-- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz
Dalnet is where I go for silly chat, that doesn't matter, and I think the services they offer (registered nicks, channels, etc) are nice.
Efnet is good for various "scenes." Efnet is where the mp3 groups hang out, and I also hang out in the semi-official Ars Technical channel, along with #litestep. IMHO. I find much more intelligent conversation on Efnet that I do on Dalnet.
The article that's linked to does point out the obvious, and Efnet is horrible about script kiddies. The number of DoS attacks are numerous, and I've been packetted for takeover purposes. On the other hand, Dalnet is rampant with various trojans/virii such as Life Stages, script.ini, Judgement Day, etc. Though Dalnet has done a pretty good job of implementing server side protection against these.
In the end, I'll still hang out on both networks because different IRC networks server different purposes.
The only disadvantage is that you can't have as many clients -- but save for help channels, how the heck are you supposed to have meaning conversations in an IRC channel with over 50 or 100 people in it???? I think smaller networks will make IRC a bit more 'worthwhile' in terms of it's original concept.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
In my past five years of experience on IRC, I've seen many networks begin, grow and die. I've seen the split of the Australian body of servers from Undernet to form their own IRC network (OzOrg), the beginnings of now the largest Australian IRC network AUSTnet, and of course, the IRCnet/EFnet split. Why does everybody think that EFnet is dying? As I write this, over 44,000 unique clients are connected to EFnet distributed over 35 servers. That's roughly 1.2k clients per server - not exactly what I'd call dying. EFnet is also largely dominated by warez and pornography due to the pure size of the network. Many of the servers are constantly subjected to Denial of Service attacks such as smurf attacks, involving a large flood of traffic, costing ISPs a considerable amount of money and downtime. Typical efnet servers need to sustain traffic rates of around 50 kilobytes per second on average, just in IRC traffic, excluding the DoS. Many ISPs decide to delink their IRC server. It's a large target to the "leet haxor" community saying "hey there! attack me!" There are no registered channels or nicknames, meaning that if you run a channel there, it's your responsibility. It's a very old network, and lacks many of the nice services that most newer IRC users would expect (eg. channel/nick registration, help services etc) from networks such as DALnet and AUSTnet. Different networks suit different people, and as long as the EFnet community remains around, the network will still exist in some shape or form. -zardoz
I can't think why any decent minded person would support the use of a protocol which is used almost solely for illegal, and quite frankly disgusting, purposes.
IRC is an open protocol for distributed "real time" text conferencing and file sharing. This potent idea continually gets reinvented. AOL's Instant Messager and Jabber are the latest incarnations of real time conferencing.
As the original killer Internet application, email has florished as a means of conferencing and file sharing. It propagated to all platforms that supported TCP/IP networking. The problem with email is that it is asynchronous. By default, it provides no notice that a message has arrived at its destination, much less was seen by the intended recipient. IRC is a way to extend the conferencing capabilities of email. You know instantly whether your message was received. For small groups, this method works well.
If AOL's IM improves (for some values of "improves") on real time conferencing Napster, Gnutella and Freenet extend file sharing to be pervasive and searchable. And yes, unlicensed files are traded with wild abandon on those networks too. Hustler magazine is printed on paper, just like currence, the Bible and Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. I wouldn't go back to using stone tables because the medium can be abused.
Of course, it is easy to pick on the senile old aunt of conferencing technologies. There is no doubt that script kiddies and p0rn abound in seedy, misspelled chat rooms. It is a shame to condemn this important technology simple because of the activities of a few reprobates. If one could judge the whole by its parts, we'd have been Usenet years ago.
You may not choose to use IRC because of the few bad apples, but you'd do well not to quickly condemn all IRCers. There is a lot useful information tucked away in those intangible rooms.
Cheers
Send flames to someone else.
Dude, I've found two decent jobs thanks to IRC (and I wouldn't rule out taking a third).
It 'aint all warez and kiddiez. Check out #php or #c sometime.
Since the end of August, EFnet has become a real pain to use. Some of the better servers, like core.com and primenet.com, have simply gone away, and others are just about impossible to get to. The ones you can get on go up and down all the time, there are endless netsplits, etc. The only semi-stable servers either belong to .edu's or are part of some network like mindspring or home.com and don't let anyone on who isn't a part of their network (understandable, but frustrating).
The article is correct in one thing: it's because of the packet kiddies. With hundreds of kids behind cable modems blasting away at servers all day long, it's no wonder that network admins take down IRC servers -- the turnover rate on EFnet servers has been amazingly high recently.
The one thing to take comfort in: despite its problems, EFnet is still "the" IRC network to most people, so if you're on another IRC network, it's taking the brunt of the assault...
Well, just imagine how the Internet as a whole would work if networks and hosts were connected ONLY by explicit static routes.
That's right, it wouldn't.
Marko Karppinen
When turbulence happens, a branch of the network sometimes gets shaken out. We had a network of servers in the United States and a slew of machines in the Czech Republic. There were a few problems with timezones (the only time I could consistently talk to the opers over there was around 8am EST). Over the summer, a few US servers dropped (some IRCops left because they no longer had as much free time, families, etc) and the Czech network became its own autonomous network.
When IRC is fun, it's a lot of fun. Unfortunately, there are always a few snotty users who think it's their devine right to pester the IRCops for weeks on end or packet a server. At some point, the IRCops have had a bad day and things like *!*@*.home.com get banned. If there were some way we could uniquely lock out a user by retinal scan or a Bad Breath breathalizer test when they connect (anyone up for re-writing identd's to do this?) we'd love to have it. However, we're stuck with broad bans in order to keep ourselves sane. It's not nice to the users, but there isn't a better solution yet.
Particularly in the cases where an IRCer is good at social engineering, we have problems. Some of those users have managed (through various subtle methods) to get O: lines on our servers and our network then goes to pieces until we figure out what happened. To be honest, I don't understand what causes people to feel the need to do that every three months, but it happens.
I used to spend a lot of time on irc.cs.cmu.edu (EFNet) and irc.cis.pitt.edu before that (they allowed bots!), before they were packeted so many times that our upstream cut them off. To me, that was when EFNet suddenly lost its appeal, because it became a chore to find a server where I could keep a stable client connection. I believe that EFNet will continue to exist as increasingly smaller numbers of large servers, as IRCops get tired of the problems and the fun (or power trips) become less rewarding.
/ \
\ / ASCII ribbon campaign for peace
x
/ \
Maybe, but we of the Undernet, when we split away from EFNet, said the same thing years ago :-). When Undernet had similar issues, about three years ago, we said the same too, and started up Yet Another Network (tm). That YAN died, and Undernet is still around. Most EFNet admins are at least halfway clued; give it time....
--
Just because the "newbies" don't use it, that doesn't mean it's dying.
The "newbies" also don't generally go to tech-info-heavy text only websites. The "newbies" don't normally use FTP in a non-URL-based way. There are a lot of things out there in this wacky world of the internet that the newbies will never try out or understand. That doesn't mean that any of them are dying.
How can something with 40,000+ client connections at any given time, and often going to over 60,000 possibly be considered dying?
"That's Tron. He fights for the Users."
"irc.ef.net will be permanently delinked because of DoS attacks"
irc.ef.net is just one EFnet server. It does not mean that all of EFnet is going down or is in serious trouble...
Servers come and servers go but EFnet has survived and will continue to Josh
When I first got on IRC in 1993, the school I was accessing it from had a 64k connection FOR THE WHOLE SCHOOL. No one really had enough bandwidth to split a server at the time. Still, distributed attacks could take over a channel or boot a user.
IMHO IRC's biggest flaw is the fact that it's servers are networked and all channels rely on that network to function. If one server goes down, you can loose half or more of the channel's users. And servers go down a lot. I t would seem to me the only reason anyone would put up with the flakieness of IRC is because they are either part of the problem, or because they enjoy the thrill of brutal internet strife.
IRCs problems are what prompted me to make something 'different'. A chat program which did not allow channel operators, banning, kicking or any of the things which typically spur DOS attacks on the servers themselves. Each room is an independant server and nicknames need only be unique per room, not per network. (and no network at all to rely on). Servers are linked similar to the Web where it gives an address and port to connect to.
Best of all, it's graphical and it's free.
They are a threat to free speech and must be silenced! - Andrea Chen
Fish! LipHo
EF has always had its ups and downs. Currently we worry about DoS attacks from skript-kiddi3s. Years ago it used to clone bots (pre TS) from scripts like Vassagos Serpent which lead to massive nick collides. What it simply boils down to is people feelings, if/when they get slammed they attack back. It dosnt matter if they take over a channel or kill an entire server anymore (or worse). *Sigh* - I miss the days when people had to know how to program ircII scripts and use a shell to even get on IRC. In most of EFs history people have always claimed EF is dying, like when eff.org left and then a few years later blackened left. The cycle just keeps repeating.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
EFnet has been a great resource for me for computer help, etc....though I've been told once or twice to RTFM. But the people there have been generally more helpful than irritating, so I'm upset to see them getting DoS attacks, etc.
If you get shunned by Efnet come to Undernet. #linux and #linuxhelp and #techies are prefectly great places to find info. Undernet is alive and well and relatively trouble free.
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
Yes, I agree, but....IRC should be dead by all rights. It is an inferior protocol implimented on mediocre servers connected haphazardly and administrated mostly by idiots [There is hardly a meritocracy amongst Opers...it's who can kiss ass the most]. The only reason the 3 major IRC networks still survive is for social, not technical reasons. People stay on IRC for the "social" structure or fabric, if you will. Put simply, all their friends are on IRC network X, so they stay put. Even though there are superior alternatives out there for most every application, the loose knit groups can't, or won't, coordinate their movements and move at once. Thus, when the individual is given the choice between using superior protocol A on their lonesome, or using crappy protocol B with their "friends", most will choose B and put up with all the crap they have to endure.
I'm at a *.edu site, and yesterday I had to try 27 SERVERS on EFnet before I could find one that would let me connect. That's ridiculous. And no, that is no exaggeration. Guess what the majority of the non-allowing servers told me? "You are not authorized to use this server." If a server isn't prepared to accept clients, it shouldn't be linked to the network. PERIOD. And by "clients," I mean global clients, not just clients within the server's own ISP.
FWIH, most of the servers that restrict their usage as such do so for one of two reasons: 1) DoS attacks or other related abuse, or 2) bots. I don't mean to sound like a troll here, but when you link to an IRC network, those are risks you take. And you don't solve them by effectively banning *@*. If a server on any other network did that, just imagine how fast they'd be delinked. Yet EFnet puts up with it.
=================================
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Quite true. Though, I haven't yet found a program that accomplishes all the primary tasks that I like to use IRC for while still giving me the breadth of choice of interfaces and such that IRC gives me.
Also...there's one thing I've noticed about IRC (I've been using efnet now for about 6-7 years)...if you don't piss anybody off, and no one else in your channel ever pisses anybody off, you rarely have takeover attempts! It's really quite amazing! Imagine that.
"That's Tron. He fights for the Users."
It seems most of these servers are impossible to connect. Anyone know of a good Web site that updates the list of all the good servers to use? Thanks. :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
>Heh, and how many of those 40,000 clients are
>bots? It's amazing how many bots you need now
>just to hold a channel.
How about none? I'm a regular on one of the original IRC channels on EFNET and we haven't had a bot protecting the channel for years.
That's what the almighty grep is for, my friend.
In the beginning, there was IRC. IRC was good, people got along, and chatting was what people did.
Then there were some differences of opinion between administrators. It's OK, these things happen. Feelings got hurt, EFnet spawns a child network. Increasingly, this happens more and more, but typically the arguments revolve around the introduction of features to give the user a better chatting environment.
There are always two sides to the argument. There are those that want things like channel ownership, more IRC operator participation in the affairs of mortals and harsher, coordinated controls against abusers of the service. Then there are those that don't want anything to change. They view IRC operators as the keepers of the links, and that those keepers should never meddle in the affairs of the users. Let them sort (battle) out their own problems. EFnet splits. The liberal operators and servers (the ones wanting the change) spawn off a new IRC network, and the conservative/reactionary operators and servers stay behind.
Think of it as evaporative cooling. As EFnet experiences its civil wars, the proportion of "to hell with the users" attitudes rises.
Eventually, this attitude starts biting the opers and admins on the ass. EFnet turns into a war zone, with DoS attacks starting to show up. A few users think they're funny and DoS the opers too.
The ugly dragon rears its head.
Now the attitude becomes "fuck everyone but my fellow opers". IRC wars move from the IRC playfield to the Internet with DDoS attacks taking down servers for the purposes of channel warfare and retaliation against opers and admins. Sometimes the ill feelings are warranted, but mostly the packet kiddies are just trying to make a nuisance of themselves. Networks suffer, ISP customers suffer, ISP's de-link their IRC servers. A free service (IRC) should not--must not--impact the ISP's ability to reliably serve its customers.
Now at this point, EFnet starts getting a shortage of big servers. Naturally there are dozens of ill-experienced, IRC savvy packet kiddies that have "grown up" a bit and want to try their hand at running servers. A few are cautiously linked in, oper abuse (already rampant on EFnet) begins to rise even faster. The line between oper and kiddie twists around a bit, more servers run by "former" (or current) packet kiddies, Internet wars abound, servers are split, packet kiddies continue to attack. Legitimate, well-staffed servers jump ship.
EFnet, in short, goes to hell.
I've always said EFnet is the ghetto of IRC networks. I would wager the vast majority of people that use EFnet to chat nowadays do so only because their friends are there, or they don't know that there are alternatives. If there was a way to reliably migrate a person's group of friends instantaneously to another more mature network, most would do it. I would.
As somoene who has worked extensively on IRC server to server protocols, I can confirm what you're saying: ircd scales rather badly. It only has gone up to the current levels thanks to the massive increases in bandwith and server memory. If IRC wants to keep the model of a single network with a unique channel namespace, and a completely decentralized network of servers, then alternate routes and cyclic links become a necessity. EFnet has been going mostly in the opposite direction: a few strong central hubs, and lots of leaves. That works better than the random-spanning-tree that IRC started with.
However...
There are other IRC networks. Dalnet, Undernet, and Yiffnet to name a few. I've found that Yiffnet is the most stable in terms of server splits, and the opers are actually friendly for a change. /join #furry and hang on to your keyboard.
Since Yiffnet is a semi-roleplaying network, there are, IIRC, two bots used to store descriptions of your character. If you ever sign on just for the hell of it, for the love of God go read the website first![1]
If, after reading the site, you decide to logon, try not to make your nick look like you're an EFnet refugee. The people there get on your case about it, and there's no real reason to have all the extra stuff[2] anyway. After logging on, read the MOTD for the server you're on, then if you feel up to it,
--
[1] What? You thought those links were to show off my leet HTML skillz?
[2] You know, stuff like _^*=+ tacked on the end and 31337 Sp311In6?
--
--
Star Trek vs Star Wars. Take a look. You may like it.
.. I just submited this to efnet.org's forum a few minutes ago.. http://www.efnet.org/forum/read.php?f=1&i=53&t=53
I am upset with the majority of comments posted here. According to many EFnet is nothing but a place with warez, no ChanServ, constant DoS attacks, and an overall "l4m3n3$$". EFnet is not this at all. Sure it has its share of warez/mp3/porn channels, but every net has an underground side to it. DoS attacks happen every where, but mostly on servers open to public. This is what everyone is crying about. If all servers go private, how will the general IRC population get on? The answer lies in geographic distribution. Why do EFnet Canadian servers only allow *.ca ? Why can't states of the US be divided up and assigned to a server. This way it cuts down on the DoS attacks.
/msg and we can talk any time :)
Another thing that many don't realize is the freedom on EFnet. If I want to create a channel with no one present, I can. I get no message from ChanServ telling me bob1234 registered my channel at the server's conception. IRCOPs should be hands off. If theres a disbute or a takeover in a channel, let them work it out. It's these basic freedoms which make EFnet such a great idea. I do concede that EFnet is not at its pinnacle right now. It has experienced massive DoS attacks, loss of servers, corrupt IRCops, and devistating takeovers. The IRCops are not to blame. They just went with the flow from a lack of rules. Sure, here's an i:line for this nice shell. Sure, I'll k-line that client even though its not a bot or clone. Sure, I'll abuse my power for anything that might better myself. If the administration of EFnet cannot keep itself clean, what hope is there for a new EFnet without DoS attacks.
It is a sad time for EFnet. We have come so far. I will stay on it until the end.
mycroft@EFnet
gimme a
To those that say, "People have always been saying EFnet is dying, but it's still here, and it will be around for a long time to go!" I agree, only insofar as EFnet will not go away.
But isn't an IRC network effectively dead when it ceases to be a reliable means for people to get online and chat? When was the last time you could get onto your EFnet channel of choice and have a conversation with the regulars? I bet if you did the math, EFnet would spend over 50% of its time with at least one major server split or with one or more heavily hit links.
When I sit down and am totally unable to have a conversation with my friends for any more than a few minutes at a time, I consider it time to move on. The only way people are going to be happy again is if they migrate to a more stable network, and nobody is going to do that until EFnet finally kicks the bucket and its existing (stable) servers either join up with a real IRC network or shut down for good.
Let EFnet die. It's functionally dead already.
Take a look at SILC, Secure Internet Live Conferencing. It's designed with better network structure, isn't a braindead protocol, and as the name says it's designed with security in mind. And to me the best thing about it is that it's new and not finished yet. I can suggest new features to it, I can fix broken things in it, I can try to make it the best chat protocol there is.
SILC is the most serious IRC replacement I've seen so far: there's working server and client code, there's documentation, even comments in the code and the specs are in RFC drafts.
The biggest reason for DOS attacks against IRC servers is (I'm pretty sure :) creating net splits and taking over channels with them. If we just design the protocol so that it is impossible to take over others' channels the network will be DOS safe (and it will be one happy chatting network ;)
Funny..I read mjr's letter from 1998 just a few days ago (I visit blackened.com every so often, and sometimes I reread the letter--it serves as a sad reminder of the lamers that are everywhere on IRC these days):
"Even the big ones fall."
- hopefully they will try to get the crackers/script kiddies in trouble for doing this.
And just what "trouble" do you expect to them into? Jonny's parents take away his computer for a week? What they are doing is illegal. It's just difficult to track down and almost impossible to prosecute -- you cannot "throw the book" at a 13yo punk. Until some FBI agents bust down the door to some central Kansas house, charge into some teen's room, and shoot him (or her) in the head at close range with a shotgun, this sort of childish bullshit will never stop.Most animals act according to an anticipation of a reward or in fear of some punishment. As a child, I learned quickly what my boundries were -- e.g. exactly what I could do without being beaten. Most parents raise their children in a violence free environment that complete negates half of our behavioral instincts -- hell, parents would be arested for abuse now-a-days if they hit their kids. ("Spare the rod; spoil the child" is true.) Setting the kid in the corner for an hour isn't punishment; it just gives them time to think up more bad things to do. When there is no fear of punishment, rewards have no meaning and children never learn to participate in a civilized society.
Now that I think about it, society has just gone to hell. Did I miss the Rapture or something? A memo would have been nice...
No offense but I've been on Undernet and IMO the users are less experienced than myself. I have been an avid Linux user since Slackware 2 (eww) and I've met very intelligent people on efNet that I learned a lot from, and I've also helped other promising script kiddies to get another life.
I have to agree, Undernet is generally younger and less hardcore for all of their subjects. But we're improving as best we can, and our network is much better than Efnets recently.
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
Here's a link to a text file that is updated three times a day and lists all the servers: http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/networks/efnet.txt. Unfortunately, all it does is list servers, so it's not full of information.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.