It has been quite a journey...

1 May 2000

Just Chat launches on a free web space server. The page provides a list of links to chat sites that did not require registration.

23 May 2000

The site gets its own domain name - www.justchat.co.uk goes live!

18 June 2000

Just Chat begins beings offering its own shared chat room using an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) channel.

17 October 2000

Just Chat gets its first redesign. Check out the fancy new logo!

Just Chat's first logo

February 2001

Just Chat gets its very own, dedicated chat room. It was named the Reception room and it hosted the first of our live chat quizzes!

July 2001

Just Chat's third design goes live. Check out that colour scheme! We also introduced Chat Guides into our chat rooms at this time.

Just Chat version 3

March 2003

Our fourth design goes live. Goodbye yellow, hello more blue!

Just Chat version 3

November 2003

The Just Chat message boards are launched.

April 2004

Just Chat version five is released along with a new logo. We kept that relaxing shade of blue, though.

Just Chat version 5

June 2005

Adeboje Mwambi from Yobe State joins the Just Chat message boards.

March 2006

After an April Fool's joke leaks stating that we'll be charging to use Just Chat, fastcars plans the first ever Just Chat sit in, forcing the JC administration to back down from implementing the charges they were never going to implement...

... or perhaps they were - in order to pay for the first Just Chat staff piss-up meeting that was held in Liverpool the same month. Highlights include yours truly winning a stunning mottled purple tie in a charity raffle and ForumHostPB chasing after a police car in an attempt to pull them over to get directions.

June 2006

Our sixth design launches. Just Chat goes from blue to orange, with the new design staying pretty much unchanged for over nine years:

Just Chat v6

Oh, and in this month, Jenny.. spent a day microwaving fruit. Unfortunately the banana blows the door off the microwave, blows the fuses in her house and her neighbours end up calling the police.

September 2007

Just Chat changes chat forum software, prompting complaints about the chat forum being 'too bright' even though the colour scheme was exactly the same as before.

'The Great Lull'

I combine a few years of sailing around the world in my luxury yacht with a crackdown on bad behaviour on the message boards. The result is few cosmetic updates to Just Chat over a long period of time and a depature of many board users to a cupboard belong to someone called PATS.

December 2015

Now we're at our present design - version seven has proven to be the most radical change to Just Chat since the site was created over fifteen years earlier. Not only has the site been updated in a big way, our chat forum software has changed for the first time in over eight years (for forums one and two at least) and the message boards software changes for the first time ever.

Just Chat v7

And there you have it. No doubt I've missed a number of landmarks along the way - so feel free to fill in any gaps via the comments section below.

5 thoughts on “A brief history of Just Chat

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  • 20 January, 2016 at 2:43 pm
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    WOW i remember all these changes now that`s bad i feel like a old rotten part of the furniture haha
    its always great to go back through memories like this,
    i remember many people past including the likes of the old knob head of a guide RD god thank bloke could hold a grudge haha i also have memories of run-ins with Robbo and a old user of F3 Called Logan (he thought he was action mans twin) some great times in JustChat over the years lets hope we have many more

    • 21 January, 2016 at 7:38 pm
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      Ahhhh yes. RD and robbo. Robbo was a guide, albeit briefly. One day he went to forum 2 I think it was, and started booting everyone from the room. Back then with the old asci chat room software, guides couldn’t boot other guides. So Martin had to log in as staff, using a normal user name, and when robbo tried to boot him he couldn’t. He was swiftly booted from staff lol.

  • 16 January, 2016 at 5:25 pm
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    Some good memories there Martin. I was here when we had the blue boards and asci chat room software. Those were the days. Remember ‘fred’? This user did something to the chat room server. Result, millions of freds logged into forum 3 at one time. Took me an age to boot the swine. Then we had a two night investigation into it. Such fun lol.

    The days of SUBS and montana. How could anyone forget those? SUBS was a pain in the beep with his scrolling. Montana attempted to be a big hard man on the boards, but was laughed off.

    Tom used to do a daily Sunday morning rant. I miss that. PB and his caustic wit, could,rip anyone to shreds. Remember Geoff?
    [IMG]http://i61.tinypic.com/zvv0qp.jpg[/IMG]

    We also had the famous STD thread. Omg the rows in there! I believe it was started to give Geoff and Owen Kash there own private forum to argue in. Trouble is, everyone else joined in as well lol.

    They were going to meet at the spinnaker tower for fisticuffs. [IMG]http://i61.tinypic.com/zvv0qp.jpg[/IMG]

    • 18 February, 2016 at 2:04 am
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      Oh yes indeed how could anyone have forgotten “Fred” and his million alter egos ” fred” lol
      I have many fond memories back in the days of Ascii with AP she was one of the best and you could be sure she was always fair with everyone.

      Some amazing memories of JC Growing here i could go on and on but that would show my age and experience of the site haha i`m trying to be a new aged user

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