Russia-based VK company has been serving as the owner of ICQ since 2010. They announced the closure of ICQ with a message they published recently. With the announcement, many of our nostalgic memories came to life. ICQ was first launched by Mirabilis in 1996 and quickly gained a large user base.
ICQ is officially shutting down on June 26th
ICQ experienced massive growth after being acquired by AOL in 1998. By 2001, ICQ had 100 million registered users.
Over time, however, it fell behind other messaging apps and was acquired by Digital Sky Technologies (now VK) in 2010. VK tried to update ICQ to resemble modern messaging apps, but these efforts never brought ICQ back to its former popularity.
Unlike other messaging apps, ICQ served its users by assigning them a number. It also had features such as sending messages to offline contacts and SMS messaging. ICQ, which was remembered by many people with its “Uh oh!” voice notification, became a symbol of the era with these unique features.
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ICQ, along with other instant messaging services such as AOL Instant Messenger and MSN Messenger, played an important role in the early days of the Internet. With the different features it offered to its users and its simple interface, it became a part of millions of people’s lives. However, the rapid changes in the world of technology and the rise of new applications have caused old services like ICQ to fade into the background over time.
ICQ had already been out of service for some time and VK’s decision only made it official. With the official closure of ICQ, an era has come to an end. Don’t forget to tell us your ICQ memories in the comments section below.
