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ICQ Starts Blocking Alternative Clients
An anonymous reader writes "It appears that since yesterday ICQ has blocked access to the ICQ network to alternative clients. Users of QIP, Adium, and other clients are getting a 'The client version you are using is too old. Please upgrade'. No comment yet from ICQ or AOL."
No problems here using Miranda IM. (http://www.miranda-im.org/)
Yes, ICQ is still big in China (Oicq) and Russia. Consider that the IM to first and fully support a character set will probably get the widest use, not to mention Oicq was fully integrated into cell phones long ago.
Actually, they're forcing windows users to upgrade.. It has nothing to do with blocking alternative clients.
In other news, GnomeICU still works and pidgin has just made a new release with sends a newer version number.
And working just fine at this very moment.
I got the "your client is too old" message today, did a manual "check for updates" and found that a new version of Adium (1.2.6) was released and after upgrading ICQ works again.
My other account has a 3-digit UID.
Kopete fixed this, well, you have to edit a config file, but once you do that it works fine on Kopete.
I was getting this earlier, but the latest seems to connect just fine.
Each processor would proceed sequentially as if it had been better for them not to rise against Saul.
Adium 1.2.6 is now out which fixes ICQ connectivity.
QQ dominates the IM market in China.
OICQ was a rip-off of ICQ but was never compatible or even the same network as ICQ.
That's only cause you didn't have an older account with less digits...
Sort of like the whole Slashdot account numbers.
My recent usage, on only one machine but my main workstation for the past 2-1/2 years, gives the following reports from du for my Adium log folder:
Note that I only used MSN and Yahoo for a long time, and added AIM just a few years ago when I moved to a state where apparently everyone is on AIM. I think that there are regional trends for one network to be more popular than others. This probably has to do with the first few people in a particular high school or college starting with one IM network and nobody in that school bothering with the others since they all told their friends "Get X!"
This is also a nonstory. The fix is just incrementing the version number on what is reported to OSCAR.
Kopete updates its version file automatically, so no need to edit anything. Kopete will do it for you.
-- B.
This sig does in fact not have the property it claims not to have.
Is that Turk-Telecom that got banned?
Because, I gotta say, wow, that netblock generates a LOT of spam. Seriously. Like 25% of my spam comes from there.
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
ICQ is also big in Germany. All of my friends use it over there. When I told a friend from the states about it she didn't even know what I'm talking about. Thanks to Miranda I can have her AIM account in the same contact list as all my other friends though.
well, I had not used it in a while, so I fired up my old pidgin client and I can connect just fine.
Yep, it's working.
No, cable ISP. They didn't ban Turk Telecom. Turk Telecom seems to care for spam reports lately (their mail spam rate going lower along with Poland) but they banned the Cable ISP. Imagine there is only Comcast in USA for Cable ISP and rest are 56K running people. You are banning entire Comcast from your network, they did something similar to it.
I still suspect some racial profiling etc. since it is really possible to hunt the individual spammers and if you are at a point of banning an entire ISP block, it is really time to call the Police of that country. OK- lets say not racial profiling but something like "Oh Turkey? Who cares, lets ban them". That decision cost them 25 million users.
Lets not forget that joke, MSN IM Protocol is a horribly engineered piece of junk and MS isn't known as some security champion company. They don't have that spam problem with 25 million potential zombies. So it can be prevented even by Microsoft.
AIM and ICQ have been the same network for a long time. I use the AIM transport in Jabber, but I use my old ICQ account and so everyone I talk to on AIM is talking to an ICQ user.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Just upgrade Pidgin to the latest version and everything will work fine.
If you can talk brilliantly enough about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered.
That was in January. In March they canceled those plans.
Well, if you go to passport.com, the first option is to create a hotmail address. Most users won't go past that. It seems to be a lot easier to get a passport for a non-hotmail address than it used to be. I rememer when I signed up for msn messenger, that it was very difficult to sign up under a different address. Either way, it's still tied to a specific email address. Which seems to be a bad thing if you ever want to change your email address.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Supposedly the only 5 digit icq numbers are for Admins. Myself and about 3 friends all have 6 digits, but everyone of them stopped using it, and use aim or gtalk now. Just logged in with mine and it still works, but only 1 friend is online... heh.
In Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union, ICQ is basically the only instant messenging protocol. (A few tech-savvy Russians have started switching to Jabber, but even they still maintain ICQ accounts to talk to their less technically inclined friends.) Not having an ICQ number in Russia is sort of like not having an email address in the US; people will look at you funny.
No problems at home and work. I wonder why other clients had problems.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
The same can be said for AIM in the US and MSN in parts of Europe...
It's disturbing, and a problem, all these disconnected networks.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
My ICQ number is 5318008. Feel free to chat.
A 5-digit /. ID grants you the equivalent of diplomatic immunity.
You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button.
This is just an incremental version update. For the licq client at least, it's a one-byte fix in /usr/bin/licq
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife