Show HN: Bringing back IRC, built in three days on a bus from SF to Austin

http://ghostpost.io

by crc321 • 13 years ago

14 17 13 years ago

ghostpost.io

tbirdz• 13 years ago

>Bringing back IRC

I wasn't aware it had gone anywhere.

blakeeb5• 13 years ago

We're bringing back the fun of it. I practically grew up in IRC rooms, and miss the anonymous-ish freedom of expression it provided.

We want ghostpost to be the mobile generation's IRC. Fun, anonymous, topical chat.

l3db3tt3r• 13 years ago

So Omegle for groups?

blakeeb5• 13 years ago

Hey all - I'm Blake, one of the devs on the team. We met each other & built this in three days. We missed IRC's concepts of group anonymity and self-expression, wanted to bring it to the mobile generation.

It's built with JS + Firebase.

Social networks are crap. People don't speak freely, care way too much about their brand & self promotion. So, we wanted a quick simple way to have brandless, anonymous communication.

Feel free to ask us questions in this thread!

Fauntleroy• 13 years ago

What is this, why does it need to exist, and how is it related to IRC at all?

blakeeb5• 13 years ago

Hey Fauntleroy - I'm one of the devs on the bus, trying not to get carsick while responding to all of these posts!

We want to bring the fun of anonymous IRC group chat to the next generation. It might not seem fun to you, but do you use SnapChat or GroupMe?

I guarantee it will take more than three days to perfect, but thanks for your comments! :)

Sunlis• 13 years ago

I fail to see the application for this. The chat looks like a bunch of children posting "dirty words" and laughing behind their random aliases. Not to mention the spamming and general lack of moderation. Please, stop this. You're killing IRC.

NateDad• 13 years ago

I fail to see how that is different than IRC.

ffreire• 13 years ago

Depends on the channels you participate in. I tend to stick to the *dev channels, which have always leaned towards civil discussion.

nicksergeant• 13 years ago

Agreed. Innovation around communication is welcomed and all of that, but this is not doing anything to stop the trolls. Anonymous chat on the internet with no provisions to control spam / garbage = useless.

blakeeb5• 13 years ago

We're deploying troll-proofs by the minute. We went live with this as an MVP. GhostOps are on their way, sticking to agile CD style for this.

blakeeb5• 13 years ago

Context: we met each other, then built it in three days on a bus from SF->Austin. We're working on it!

We want to bring the fun of anonymous IRC group chat to the next generation.

I guarantee it will take more than three days to perfect, but thanks for your comments! :)

patejam• 13 years ago

IRC isn't about being anonymous. Its about having a simple protocol that makes chat portable and easy to make on the fly.

NotOnTheBus• 13 years ago

I didn't totally buy the innovation of it at first either, but I think beyond a fun social platform, I think it offers a really interesting platform for generating "real" discussions or feedback. For example, a company could use something like this to host a Q&A with management, or for a focus group, etc. In other words, I could see this replacing some of the application for Survey Monkey by having an interactive yet still anonymous way for people to have a frank discussion. Who knows, maybe parents and teachers could talk with their kids, even! :)

abroadway• 13 years ago

I can see how this would be useful inside a large development team where junior devs might be too embarrassed to ask a 'dumb' question, without feeling inferior to the "rock stars". (This could be useful for other Communities of Practice where N00Bs are intimidated/too-scared to participate in serious discussion).

I'd possibly use this to replace Campfire, with a toggle for Anon/Identified posts.

vacipr• 13 years ago

Currently there is too much wasted space.I see 6 messages on my puny 1366x768 screen.

stephen_mcd• 13 years ago

Check out Gnotty if you're interested in actual IRC with a responsive mobile interface:

https://github.com/stephenmcd/gnotty

Show HN: Bringing back IRC, built in three days on a bus from SF to Austin

Related Stories