IRC is an acronym that stands for Internet Relay Chat. IRC was created in August 1988 by the Finnish Jarkko Oikarinen who invented IRC1.0, the first version of this software that allowed live communication with people scattered across the Network.
IRC is a small program that allows remote computers connected to the Internet to chat and talk with all the other users connected to IRC servers scattered worldwide. IRC servers are very numerous and today there are many all over the world; all servers are connected to each other and divided into “groups,” each constituting an IRC Network.
But how did Jarkko Oikarinen come up with the idea to create IRC?
In the summer of 1988, Jarkko Oikarinen was working at the Information Processing Department at the University of Oulu (Finland) and at that time he had quite a bit of free time: the management of the department’s Sun server did not occupy all his time. So he started creating a multiuser communication program to make OuluBox, the university’s BBS, a bit more accessible and user-friendly. His idea was to enable a real-time discussion group, somewhat like what happened on USENET news servers. At the same time, another Finnish programmer, Jyrki Kuoppala, had managed to create a stable discussion system but without implementing the concept of channels; his program therefore allowed exclusively one-to-one conversations.
Jukka Pihl, another Finnish programmer, had recently developed a program similar to what Jarkko Oikarinen had in mind, the MUT (Multi User Talk), the true basis of the future IRC: its only substantial flaw was the instability of the system, which still had not managed to provide stable communication.
Jarkko Oikarinen started precisely from MUT to create what is now known as IRC, the Internet Relay Chat. The first working IRC server was tolsun.oulu.fi, naturally in Finland. Subsequently, Jarkko Oikarinen convinced some friends to open IRC servers also in southern Finland, mainly at universities with good technological centers such as Tampere and Helsinki. However, at first, IRC did not have the opportunity to spread beyond Finland: the Internet connections at the time were an insurmountable barrier; Finland was practically isolated and the only result was that IRC spread only there. In 1990, IRC was still a niche phenomenon. It was only when Jarkko Oikarinen managed to get in touch with MIT (the Massachusetts Institute of Technology) that he found the first IRC user outside Finland: Mike Jacobs.
Later, thanks to collaborations with the University of Denver and Oregon State University, IRC managed to break out and cross Finland’s borders, spreading worldwide. Jarkko Oikarinen thus met people from all over the world online, who together formed the first IRC network, now known as EFNet (Eris-Free Net). Since then, IRC’s growth has been unstoppable: in ’94, the number of IRC users on the EFnet network alone was about 5,000; by ’95, it had reached 15,000; two years later, in 1997, it was already 30,000. Currently, on the IRCnet network (the most widespread in Europe and the USA), there are on average 60,000 users connected simultaneously. Adding to this the fact that IRC server networks are very numerous (the most important include DALnet, EFnet, IRCnet, and Undernet), one can easily understand that an impressive number of messages are exchanged every day via IRC.
IRC quickly proved to be a versatile and indispensable tool, not only for recreational communication and exchanging information but it also became a means of communication with a much higher social and symbolic value: the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the communist empire in Russia the following year allowed people from former communist countries to communicate on IRC, actively participating in events and developments involving the rest of the world, from which the regime had partly excluded them. Not only that: IRC also demonstrated its communicative effectiveness during Operation Desert Storm when Saddam Hussein attacked Kuwait in mid-January 1991. The inhabitants of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia sent messages through IRC to inform America about war bulletins and developments of the conflict.
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