FICS down?

[jdart]

Looks like FICS (freechess.org) is down - site responds to "ping' and the website is up, but connect requests to the server on port 5000 do not succeed.

[jdart]

It is back up now.

[jshriver]

FICS is such a nice place with a rich history. Feel so conflicted on its aging with lichess taking so much of the traffic now adays. Just looking at the monthly pgn dumps and fics has been constantly shrinking for years.

Plus I've noticed a TON of guest games due to phone apps piggy backing off fics for mobile play/matching.

=Josh

[AdminX]

FICS is such a nice place with a rich history. Feel so conflicted on its aging with lichess taking so much of the traffic now adays. Just looking at the monthly pgn dumps and fics has been constantly shrinking for years.

Plus I've noticed a TON of guest games due to phone apps piggy backing off fics for mobile play/matching.

=Josh

I think allot of this is to do with ease of use and accessibility. A web interface might help FICS stay around longer. Playchess has one, and I don't think it hurts them.

[mvanthoor]

I think allot of this is to do with ease of use and accessibility.

This... FICS still looks and feels like a website from the 90's and using it is laborious compared to sites such as Lichess. People are not going to even try that in this day and age, if _if_ they have the skills.

[jdart]

I don't care if it has a UI or not. I am running Arasan on it with icsdrone from the console. The machine it is on doesn't have have a GUI.

[AdminX]

I don't care if it has a UI or not. I am running Arasan on it with icsdrone from the console. The machine it is on doesn't have have a GUI.

I am sure that you don't, however I would bet that you are not the normal user of online chess. Hell most of us on talkchess are not normal online chess users. Most of us would be considered advanced users.

[reflectionofpower]

FICS is such a nice place with a rich history. Feel so conflicted on its aging with lichess taking so much of the traffic now adays. Just looking at the monthly pgn dumps and fics has been constantly shrinking for years.

Plus I've noticed a TON of guest games due to phone apps piggy backing off fics for mobile play/matching.

=Josh

I think allot of this is to do with ease of use and accessibility. A web interface might help FICS stay around longer. Playchess has one, and I don't think it hurts them.

What AdminX said here is the bottom line! ICC is dying because of it and still charging people to play there when other sites like Lichess.org & chess.com you can play for free ( I am paying member at both sites) and the user friendliness and more advanced features are light years ahead of it. FICS I just recently had to stop playing there because the only interface I use Raptor would not work in Windows 10 so I sadly had them close my account but I liked playing there and was still an active member there as of 2 months ago.