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Thousands of ICQ Numbers Deleted

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the subtle-hints dept.

BondGamer writes "Many ICQ users woke up and found their ICQ numbers were no longer working. There is a topic on the ICQ support with more than 1,500 replies. There are pages upon pages of other topics asking what happened. As of yet, there has been no official response from AOL about what has happened."

4 of 264 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Still Around by zwei2stein · · Score: 5, Informative

    Number of people i _personally_ know who use ICQ: pretty much everyone.
    Number of people i _personally_ know who use something else than ICQ: pretty much noone.

    Here in Czechia, ICQ is simply THE im to use.

    IT just makes no sense to register on something else when you know you wont be able to talk to anyone. And it makes no sense to switch if majority does no switch with you.

    ---

    In the end stuff like aim or messenger have exaclty same type of bloat (sometimes even more anoying than icq bloat) and zero killer features.

    --
    -- Technology for the sake of technology is as pathetic as eschewing technology because it's technology.
  2. Possible Fix?!? by jkwscurvy · · Score: 5, Informative

    It appears to just be a bug, and your numbers are safe. Backup, remove, reinstall as described here: http://boards.icq.com/boards/view_messages.php?tid =4555&topic_id=2216365. YMMV

  3. Re:Backups? by Viraptor · · Score: 5, Informative

    Seems it's not server problem (not for all at least):
    Citing board post

    "[...]This is a nasty ICQ6 bug, but it is fixed with a complete uninstall of all user data and reinstall.[...]"

    Some other users also say that it helped. Maybe it's an organized hoax, but whatever. You may want to backup your data and try.

  4. Centralized by Eivind · · Score: 4, Informative

    In an ideal world, this would teach people something about the disadvantages of relying on a centralized server controlled by a corporation over which you have no influence for your communication-infrastructure.

    Msn, and Aim have similar problems.

    Meanwhile, Jabber is the way of the future. Open protocol. Multiple interoperable implementations. Gateways to these "legacy"-protocols anyway, so you can still talk to your icq/msn-using friends. Multiple simultaneous logins. Server-side storage of buddy-lists (so log on from a different location/new computer and everything is there)

    Oh, and for added bonus, jabber-ids on the format of email-adresses are a lot easier to remember than ICQ-uins.