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Ask HN: Abandoned/dead projects you think died before their time and why?

358 points ofalkaed | 1 comments | 11 Oct 25 22:16 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source

Just curious and who knows, maybe someone will adopt it or develop something new based on its ideas.
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kesor ◴[12 Oct 25 08:45 UTC] No.45556528[source]▶
ICQ ; It was the first instant messenger, the technology could have adopted voice (and not get disrupted by Skype) and mobile (and not get disrupted by whatsapp) and group chat (and not get disrupted by slack/discord). But they didn't even try and put up a fight.
replies(2): >>45556549 #>>45559892 #
1. rkomorn ◴[12 Oct 25 08:48 UTC] No.45556549[source]▶
They got bought by AOL in 98, long before most/all of this innovation happened?

Edit: in fact I'd say they were irrelevant before pretty much all of those innovations. By the time AIM or MSN Messenger really became popular, ICQ didn't matter anymore.