escargot
escargot
Hello buddies, we've got big news!
It's chilly and cloudy here at the NINA & Escargot HQ in Kansas, which is a great day to stay in and bask in the wonders of AIM, now free and publicly available.
We support all versions of AIM, and all features are functional, however client-to-client features such as talk (voice chat), video, file transfers, direct connections (image sharing), etc won't be finalized until the next update. Additionally, some features in much later versions of AIM such as 7.5, 8.0 such as Lifestream and image sharing have not yet launched as we're still ironing out the details and they'll be coming soon, but overall these clients are functional.
We'll be releasing a server update soon with bug and feature fixes which have come up since the public launch.
This update has been a long time coming, thousands of hours of development, research, and testing and now AIM is ready for primetime. We made it publicly available in a soft launch late last week, however now it's time to get the word out and get more people chatting.
If you've got an Escargot account or just want to get on AIM right now, all you need to do is follow the instructions here.
I'm glad we could finally bring this to the community, which for me personally is the best Internet community I have ever been a part of. It's wonderful to see so many people enjoying our projects, contributing help to others, and just having laid back conversations with each other about whatever comes to mind. I also want to say that these have been the best developers I've ever had the pleasure of working with.
While AIM may be public, ICQ however is still in gamma as some features are still incomplete, there's still some development that needs to be done however it is available for anyone who donates (or has donated) at least $2 USD. Once ICQ is ready for primetime, then it too will be public, and we don't have an ETA on that since ICQ's protocol and scope of functionality is massive compared to AIM, but we are making progress.
We're also making progress on Escargot 2.0 and getting classic AOL support from the alpha phase to the beta phase. For those who paid $2 for early access to AIM you have been given access to PowerTools, which is basically our version of Discord Nitro, for now it only allows you to speak in the last-call chat directly from Discord, however in the near future it will open up additional features and access within AIM, ICQ, etc. Of course all gamma tier and higher donors also have PowerTools so if you've donated before, you're already in the butter zone, baby.
Now that AIM is freely available, running it is not free, so we still need your support. You can support us via: a one time or recurring donation, both of which come with rewards and Discord roles, learn more here.
If you can't donate, don't tell us, instead you can still help by telling others about us via tweets, toots, videos, or whatever else you can think of.
Hello buddies,
Well it's an unusually hot day here in Kansas -- a perfect day for updates. The
gap between the last update and now is primarily because of our focus on
finalizing AIM/ICQ and preparing for Escargot 2.0. There will also be an update
next week for things which didn't make it into this release.
AIM and ICQ early access is now $2, however that does not come with any special supporter channel access, priority support, behind the scenes info, or early access to anything else which comes up in gamma, so the cool kids club still is $5.
We really need your help, we're still looking to expand in preparation for Escargot 2.0 and this month we've got several domain renewals, and aside from our wonderfully dedicated Patrons and Boosters there have been only a couple of smaller donations. So if you want to help and are able to, see the bottom of this announcement for links.
Now, on to the actual updates:
If you don't see your issue here or just want to be sure we know about it (we may not since some bugs go unreported because people believe we don't know or don't care) please let us know. If we already know of the issue, we still appreciate the reporting.
Donating to keep projects you love alive is important, and we do need your help to keep things running and development going. We don't sell your data or bombard you with ads, so money is always very low, but if you can help and want special benefits.
You can make a one time donation via:
If you wish to support us more long term though you can subscribe via an option below (comes with even more rewards), and it will help keep us going into the future.
Hello buddies,
A few more AOL/AIM/ICQ service updates and fixes for you!
Not as many updates this time, that's because we're focusing on a few things:
Needless to say, these will require upgrades and more server space so please consider donating (details below and on the donation page) so we can move along with this stuff much faster. As it stands right now, for example, we are $96 behind in hosting and we need your help to expand. We aren't at risk of things going down, other than by the limitations of our current environment, so fear not.
Now, on to the actual updates:
If you don't see your issue here or just want to be sure we know about it (we may not since some bugs go unreported because people believe we don't know or don't care) please let us know. If we already know of the issue, we still appreciate the reporting.
Save the date. webEscargot is out December 18th for everyone.
(Out for beta testers now: check the donate page to get into beta-testing and using webEscargot right now.)
Hey everyone! webEscargot, a web-based client for Escargot, is officially in it's alpha testing stage, if you want to test it out, donate and join the Alpha Team - click here to know more.
Currently it supports MSNP18, sending / receiving messages and nudges, emoticons (Windows Live Messenger styled emoticons!), receiving ink (doodles), receiving display pictures, and more to come in the future. New updates are coming every few days for alpha testers.
Donating helps us keep developing and hosting Escargot 😄 And we need your feedback too, so if you're interested, please consider donating.
Here's some sneak peeks of the UI. Huge thanks to vl1 for the UI theme. Yes, we have dark mode too.
Happy Halloween everyone! As a spooky surprise we've decided to add a special theme to our website (for a limited time only, obviously).
Look out for spooky stuff! And look out for scary skeletons... They're too spooky.
Modernization is over. If your account does not end in @escargot.chat, you have missed your opportunity to modernize -- and so if you missed the final window to modernize, we're sorry.
You can register again at any time, but you will have to find your contacts again.
We have had notices for three months, we have given alerts, sent IMs, even sent emails to the most active accounts, but for some reason despite all this, some people simply never modernized even when bothered by an IM every 30 seconds telling them to do so. Therefore, if you didn't modernize and you have signed on to MSN in the last three months, you really have no one to blame but yourself.
The good news is, this opens the door for many more opportunities now that we have a lot of stuff cleaned out of our databases. Keep an eye out for more things coming soon, such as @escargot.live addresses and email forwarding for people who donate -- and we still need donations to keep things running.
If you're wondering about why modernization happened, you can read the old Modernize yourself! news article.
You may also now login with your Escargot username to Yahoo! 6 as well.
More to come very soon!
We're constantly trying to improve all of our services, and now it's your time to shine! Modernize your account RIGHT NOW!
If you don't modernize your account, it'll be permanently deleted on March 20th. Don't wanna risk your precious contacts and conversations, right?
Modernizing will make your account even more secure, you can change your display name, you can make your email private! That's right, you now get a fancy, schmancy @escargot.chat email to use on Escargot!
If you have any questions whatsoever, just ask for help on our Discord, we're happy to help.
There are actually a lot of reasons, but the most straight forward are:
1) Compatibility with older clients which accept only @hotmail.com addresses, and other protocols such as AIM/AOL and Yahoo.
2) Privacy: So that you can have a real email address associated with your account (that no other users can see) and still have a login that you want.
Your new login name will automatically appear on their contact list after they sign on again and will appear the same to them, so they will still know who you are. The reverse is also true, anyone on your contact list who modernizes will show up again the next time you sign on. It is advised while modernization is happening, that people re-sign on at least once a day, though most people will likely modernize within the first week.
Unfortunately those who have earned @escargot.live logins will have to wait until modernization is complete, then they will be able to begin using their login. All those who have earned the will be notified.
If you wanna know what it is, click here.
No, at least not right now. While it is true when we started this stage of the project we said you could, but it's just too complex for now. Later on you will be able to register an email address as your login, but it'll have to be a new user, however you will be able to link it with your old account. This won't be available until sometime later.... We will publicly announce when you can do this.
Check our donate page for more information!
Our new site is up, how about that?
There's a new patch tool available, USE IT EVEN IF YOU ARE ALREADY USING A PATCHED VERSION OF MSN/WLM IT WILL FIX THE HOST NAME. Unless you're already using the new hosts (and you almost certainly are not):
INI:
server = msnmsgr.escargot.chat configserver = conf.escargot.chatYOU MUST PATCH TO THESE NEW HOSTS AND THE TOOL WILL DO IT FOR ALL OF YOUR INSTALLED VERSIONS!