I also personally witnessed multiple friends who dropped out of college due to IRC addiction in the early 1990s.
I am curious if anyone else has a similar memory of IRC.
How quaint
Care to elaborate?
I also knew people who had MUD addictions.
These were very similar to how in later years people became addicted to Second Life or EverQuest and essentially dropped out of society.
I don't know if there is a modern-day equivalent, to be honest.
Well, almost. Apparently, it has its own wikipedia article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netsplit
Fun times.
Why Real Life is better than IRC (2000)
https://everything2.com/node/e2node/Why%20Real%20Life%20is%2...