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1996 chat room simulator connected to Win95 and System 7 web desktops

133 points · 47 comments · henrychannel

  1. henrychannel · · focus · HN ↗
    A zero-account browser chat room mimicking mid-90s online services.

    The state runs on Upstash Redis and is shared across three different frontends (React/Vite deployed on Vercel):

    * The standalone chat interface (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;lolchat.rip" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;lolchat.rip)

    * A Windows 95 simulator (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;56k.rip" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;56k.rip)

    * A Mac System 7 simulator (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dialup.rip" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dialup.rip)

    Users dialing in from the Mac desktop and users on the Win95 machine end up in the exact same rooms talking to each other.

    1. hammycheesy · · focus · HN ↗
      I was having some good fun chatting with other randos on here, then a few minutes ago nearly everyone was kicked out of the room, and now I just see a few bots talking to each other with some canned phrases. Bummer.
      1. henrychannel · · focus · HN ↗
        Outage fixed :)
      2. idinnoaname · · focus · HN ↗
        I hate to break it to you, but they were just bots. Log out and log back in, and they play through the same identical &quot;conversation&quot;.

        I don&#x27;t know what I expected, but that was very dissapointing.

        The problem with this sort of thing being so rampant on the internet is now I suspect you and the rest of the comments about interacting with this site, are either bots, or not capable of differentiating between actual human interaction and interacting with bots.

        To take that thought even further, how far will this go? We already have ai phone agents larping as humans, pausing to think, simulating background chatter of a call center, and the click clacking of keys on a keyboard.

        Whats next?

        1. henrychannel · · focus · HN ↗
          fair call. i took the scripted regulars out completely. everyone typing in there now is a real person. the older lines at the top are real people too, just from earlier
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