Tonight on GeekNights, we cover a topic that we covered first in 2006: Instant Messaging. The decade that has passed brought great change, and not all for the better. Smartphones entirely altered the landscape of messaging technology, federation died before it ever truly lived, and the world of IM is a fractured mess. Join us for a look at IM 10 years later: we're curious to see how our concerns compare to those of a decade ago.

In the news, Pebble is dead, the smartwatch industry is largely moribund, and malware is fiendishly clever.

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Tonight on GeekNights, on our 11th anniversary show, we talk about the big DDOS that hit the US while Rym was in Sydney. In the non-spoopy news, the new Macbooks are underwhelming, and you can be hacked via your microphones and speakers. Don't use OpenDNS to get around DNS DDOSes, but do listen to our show from 2011 on DNS!

We'll be live at GaymerX on Sunday talking about writing game rules, and also live at MAGFest! Support GeekNights on Patreon!

Tonight on GeekNights, we talk about Scott's opinions of HFS+ and case-sensitivity. In other news, del.icio.us appears to finally be on the long grim road toward death, Scott has replaced it with Pinboard, the main danger of Augmented Reality Forks is poop-flavor hacking, and the AP no longer capitalizes Internet.

The GeekNights Patreon is so close to its first goal that Rym is going to publish (soon) the first ever episode of GeekNights: before the October 31 2005 official beginning!

Peeple was going to be a service where you... reviewed people. It came and went before it was born, generated unfathomable outrage, and is the topic of tonight's GeekNights. Mark my words: there will be dozens of services like peeple would have been in the nearing future, and you can not prevent them from existing. In the news, Volkswagen committed egregious crimes, and what they did is likely no less than a massive and widespread corporate conspiracy. Adobe updated and consolidated several of their phone apps. Also, Rym almost died in the Australian bush.

Tonight on GeekNights, from host file to adblock, we discuss the technology of ad blocking. European telecoms are considering blocking ads on mobile networks (in an egregious and bad-faith violation of basic network neutrality). A drug dealer was caught in a particularly interesting way. Windows 10 isn't a free upgrade for pirates. Slashdot's community has gotten increasingly conservative and regressive.

Tonight on GeekNights, we talk about kids growing up today and how they seem to be adapting technology into their lives (both for good and for ill), simultaneously more and less competent with it than their parents, and how the "digital divide" may be sharper than we realize. In the news, Amazon now has a 3D printing store, and the newly discovered CrAssphage wins the award for most aptly named virus.

Join us at PAX Prime! Join us at PAX Dev! Join us at the Pre-PAX Sky High Tabletop Charity Play (which is NOT yet sold out)! Don't have a badge? Stay tuned for our giveaway of TWO four-day PAX passes! What?!

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider what happens when Internet services die (like we assume Flickr and Google Voice will). In the news, there are rumors that Twitter will drop @user and #hashtag characters, e-cigarettes are as terrible for you as one should assume, and people are poisoning themselves with e-cigarette liquids in unsurprising numbers. Also, if you have Verizon FIOS, you have to buy your own damn battery. If you didn't notice it beeping for the last several months, you should get your ears checked out.

We'll be at Zenkaikon and PAX East! The GeekNights Book Club book is Wool!