Forums General Discussion Why is Khaled so secretive?

why is he?
I know he prob gets a million questions everyday
but why else

So secretive about what?
He's got a section on this website which tells you a fair bit about him.

I've never thought of him as being particularly secretive. Maybe he doesn't answer all emails the second he gets them, I'd say that's more a matter of finding the time rather than secrecy.

He is sort of a celebrity, but truly you are only using software he created and works on. Frankly, he shares a lot more about his life though his web page (starbucks gives url) than most folks I know on line and off !!

He doesn't announce estimated release dates, doesn't speak of features he's working at, doesn't appear on IRC to answer people's questions.

No "celebrity" behaves like that. Even people from Microsoft condescend and talk to us mortals at forums, showing that they care about people who make their living.

I've heard a guess that explains everything: Khaled doesn't speak English. Tjerk translates the help file and the web page for him.

I don't suppose Khaled is any more or less secretive than anyone else who's a 'celebrity' in their field. Like starbucks mafia and Karen say, there's his own website if you want more personal info...and the pro's and cons of giving details before a new release of mIRC is due out is discussed elsewhere in the forums. Can you imagine how tedious it would be for him if he did chat on IRC (under his own name!) to answer the same questions over and over? As for him not speaking English, although it's not his native language, he lives in London so I think he'd have picked it up!

gezz leave the man alone lol

i only run a simple #mIRC help channel .. and i get tired of ppl buging me .. if u ask me K puts up with alot :P

can u even fathom the number of emails he gets.. now i get alof of emails .. but its not even a fraction of what he gets flooded with in and out of every singal day (i can only asume)

as far as release dates etc .. this again is only a guess .. but i know when if i were makeing a program for the public (most of what i code i dont release) i wouldnt give a release date.. maybe to my close friends an estimated release date.. and the reason i wouldnt do it is because i wouldnt know when that date was.. u can guess.. but what if you guess early .. mIRC is HUGE .. if he sez .. ok in the ball park of THIS DATE .. but something comes up in his family .. or there is a bug he that is just realy a pain to get ride of .. or a last minit feature he wants to get into the new version .. then i'd guess he needs plenty of time to test everything to make sure its praticly bug free.. so he tests somethign for what .. 3 weeks after last change before release with no bugs.. gives it 1 more week and finds a bug that might take him anouther month to fix .. and then there is the time in testing for bugs again to make sure he gets as many as he can?

of course i can only guess at all this .. thats how i'd be anyway .. i'm sure K has alot beter system then mine .. but still

your askin an aweful lot .. these boards alow you as the general public to express your opnion and report bugs, along with give feature requests

and i do know for a fact that he does read alot of these posts .. at least in the bug reports/feature requests sections.

this board in itself shows how much he cares..

eh .. i could go on .. but i think u get the point.. i hope so anyway :P

Cobra^

You can't deny the fact that lots of people would like to communicate with the author just to synchronize their scripting with his future plans, or simply to make sure he's still alive.

It would take him about 5 minutes a week to show himself on IRC, or is it too much?

What would be wrong, for example, with informing users about adding transparency to the next version, so that people won't waste their time implementing it with DLLs ?

But what amuses me the most is the "political correctness" of our moderators. Whenever a person comes up with polite and well-founded critics (or suggestion), he gets "Khaled is OMG, have a bit of respect, get on your knees and welcome to the wonderful world of mIRC!

1. your more than welcome to be a ctitic and voice your opnion

2. i dont bow before anyone .. i state my opnion as it is, regardless .. i have just as much right to voice mine as you do :P

3. i do have alot of respect for Khaled .. look at what he has done with mIRC .. its not all bad to acnkowledge good works of others u know.

4. 5 mins!! .. yeah right .. u know how many users would be in that location .. how many questions he'd have to run though .. .. trying to be fair and give everyone a chance..

you have the opertunity to communicate with him though this board.. .. if u wish to sugest that he make an irc apearence then feel free to do so, but u didnt put it as a sugestion .. u put it as a cut at the fact that he hasnt (as far as u know)

Cobra^

I don't know about you, but when I've finished work for the day, I just want to relax. I don't want to spend my free time analyzing and discussing it to the Nth degree, and answering the same questions over and over again ad nauseum. As Cobra pointed out - that's what this board is for. I personally feel that Khaled gives as much information as is necessary. Good grief...you expect him to eat, sleep and breathe mIRC? He's said himself, he had no idea how massive it was going to be when he first coded it. Again, as Cobra said - give the guy a break! :tongue:

mIRC is not necessary to run a machine. Unfortunately, microsoft products generally are, one way or another. I think you've taken that out of context, just a tad!

Eh, Cobra, the real problem is that YOU are sitting here telling us what Khaled would feel and say if he could...

People often wonder why God doesn't talk to them. The usual replies are:

1. He has said everything in his Holy Book (webpage).
2. He has sent his son (Tjerk) to preach the truth (FAQ) to us.
3. He speaks through his prophets (moderators).

Just a funny resemblance.

I'm probably more secretive than Khaled.

/me is waiting Khaled's reply to this post.
Will he ? IMO, he will not. He is secretive because he is busy or something else but nothing change his secretive.

Necroman, you assume WAY too much, but frankly, that's ok, because you come off to others a pompus individual.

Khaled does in fact come to IRC, I know, I've chatted with him there. He in fact does reply to emails, far more than MOST other company's do.

Maybe you would be soothed if he provided you with a daily schedule of his life, including food and bathroom breaks :tongue:

When will the new version come out?

simple answer: When it comes out!

sorry couldnt resist that one

Maybe you would be soothed if he provided you with a daily schedule of his life, including food and bathroom breaks

This would make for a great new forum here. I'd be glad to share my schedule with all :-)

If you connected to whatever network it is you use, and you see someone named "khaled" "BigK" "Arnie" or something to that effect, in some help room, would YOU believe its Khaled? i wouldnt, i would assume khaled comes on with a totally different nick just so he WONT get inundated with some of the silly ass problems people have with his excellent program.


There is NO compasison between Mikro$sloft and khaled, khaled works hard to produce a great program where as Mikro$sloft "MVPs" or whatever the heck they call themselves, only come out to inflate thier big fat egos, as is evidenced by most of thier siglines, "SO and SO, MVP-webpage" or however it is they do it now.

Just left the forum for a few hours, and look how much feedback is here! :P

keeker, so you think Khaled cannot get himself a valid Undernet (or whatever) userid, and publish it for everyone's certainty? And before blaming Micro$oft (while using their software) recall what OS drives mIRC.

Karen, I can't believe you're calling me names. It isn't politically correct, is it. Anyway, you shouldn't get mad at me just because you saw yourself in the mirror of my post.

Enough flames. Getting back to the subject, I'll try to summarize what I've said earlier.

1. Khaled is not a public person, as the original poster mentioned. Personally, I wouldn't call him secretive (it's better to avoid strong adjectives, like "pompous individual"), but mIRC promotion would make any management teacher commit suicide.

2. I don't believe that Khaled has no time. Even presidents arrange meetings with their nations. Even William Gates and Linus Thorvalds, whose number of users is incomparable with that of Khaled, give interviews and share their opinions on the future of computers.

3. If Khaled REALLY has no time, is everything OK with his development model?

Continuing my analogy with religion, most of us are left to pray, wait for mana, and worship the icons The question about the next version stays similar to the one about the Last Judgement. In both cases the answer is "you'll know when it comes".

Karen, I can't believe you're calling me names. It isn't politically correct, is it. Anyway, you shouldn't get mad at me just because you saw yourself in the mirror of my post.
I am far from politically correct. You 'assume' way too much. As for 'calling' you a pompus individual, if the shoe fits, feel free to wear it.

If you like mIRC, use it. When new releases are deemed ready for release, they will be released. If you choose to update at that time, so be it. When you need help with mIRC, visit these forums or the #mIRC channel of your choice. If you expect something beyond these things, Im afraid you'll be disappointed.

I am.

Have you ever tried to analyze why mIRC has become as successful as it is? Was it technically superior to its competitors?

Not at all. It created a unique community around itself, quite unexpectedly. A symbiosis of a chat client and a scripting host, in conjunction with IRC magic - seasoned users involving new ones, like in a chain reaction.

A community is a very vulnerable phenomenon, it needs care and attention. It needs to see a pillar of fire ahead.

If people keep asking about new features or new versions, it doesn't mean they're stupid. It only means they expect programmers to keep in touch with them. They've got used to such behaviour, it's normal.

I'm disappointed because I'd like mIRC to evolve faster, and I believe that communication with users is one of the few ways to achieve that.

<rant>
Your comparisons between Khaled's user-relations and those of professional software companies (ie. Microsoft) is unfair. First off, does Bill Gates or Steve Balmer come to forums to talk to you about Microsoft programs? Hell no, you get someone else whose job description particularly states 'talk crap to users for a few mins every once in a while'. In mIRC's case, you get these forums, and the guys who gets the unfortunate task of dealing with the users is Tjerk and the moderators. Only differences being this isn't their job and they don't get paid.

Even then it's not like Khaled is unreachable, his email address is given out openly and anyone is free to use it. Obviously there's a delay - expecting otherwise would be ridiculous, after all there's a lot for one man to go through - and that is the essence of the problem - Khaled doesn't have a department which handles user emails, he doesn't have a building filled with phones manned by technicians, he doesn't have top coders working with him in his projects - and why? Because the people behind mIRC aren't a software company, because this isn't a 'standard' commercial program - it's just a program a guy made which got way more popular than anyone ever expected.

This thread isn't even about Khaled's 'secrecy' anymore, it's gone into "why doesn't Khaled come talk to me?", quite frankly the answer's are obvious.
</rant>

Personally, I have nothing to ask Khaled. But other people do.

Everybody is ready to give 100 valid reasons why there is some "conspiracy" about mIRC. I agree with yours too, starbucks. You're damn right.

But does it solve anything? The problem remains, it wasn't thought up by me. You may hang a bunch of sticky threads, you may release FAQs daily... but it's like asking poor people to accept the laws of economics.

i have to ask

'the problem remains'

and what problem would that be? the fact is that this is K 's program .. and his system .. if these had been made in the form of a reqest, rather than a critisizem. then he would have somethign to reply to .. but frankly .. this entire thread is a waist of time.

myself, and the other moderators, and #mIRC staff everywhere accross all the networks deal with ppl like you in and out of every day .. infact .. unfortuantly .. ever ones worse .. lol

get a life man, grow up a little.

in regards to you compairing this with religion .. if you think that this is heaven .. or that K is God himself .. well then you have issues of your own to work out. seak conciling. I can asure you, both Khaled, and God (although 2 different entities) both exist :P

but we can discuse religion elsewhere (feel free to email me)

as far as this thread goes.. i've yet to see 1 valid point .. just a bunch of 'flameing' as u put it. .. which is in itself worthless .. and a waist of time.

so good day and good night .. i'm going to bed :P

Cobra^

myself, and the other moderators, and #mIRC staff everywhere accross all the networks deal with ppl like you in and out of every day .. infact .. unfortuantly .. ever ones worse .. lol

Are you a #mIRC 'staff member' voluntarily? It's just that your comments sound like you and the others are whipped into submission. I differ in one respect - I don't take people's opinions personally even if they are wrong. Going by what you say it's almost like you have to be a host on #mIRC somewhere to be a valid contributor, if so then that's the biggest load of bull I've ever seen. Many of the BIG contributors to the mIRC fraternity, whether it be suggestions for improvements to mIRC, creators of dll's, good scripts, tutorials, etc, over time arn't hosts on any mIRC related room.

I am.
Life is like that


I was going to write a whole long thing, but the more I think about it, the more I think Starbucks is right. Bitterness doesn't become anyone this time of year.

Happy Holidays, Nec

Why is Khaled so secretive? single choice

He secretly is Bill Gates taking a bathroom break (14%, 6 Votes)

secretive? Read his webpages! (9%, 4 Votes)

flamebait, more flamebait (7%, 3 Votes)

because of his development model (9%, 4 Votes)

why doesn't he talk to me? (7%, 3 Votes)

Khaled? Arnie! (11%, 5 Votes)

Happy Holidays (43%, 19 Votes)

Total Votes: 44 Voting on this poll ends: 0 seconds ago

Thanks for warming the athmosphere up a bit, Tjerk

Happy holidays, Karen. May Santa bring you posters who never complain

There are still a lot of things that unite us. If we both didn't care about mIRC, would we have typed so much?

LMAO Tjerk...happy holidays gets my vote. Oops, now I've let the cat out of the bag which way I voted. /umode +very_secretive

* useless comment deleted by Krejt *

nope, sorry for giving the wrong impresion there

i'm a volenteer just like the others :P Here hecause its a hobbie, i enjoy codeing and apricate the opertunity to do more.

it just gets iritating listing to ppl do nothing but complain :P lol

Cobra^

Can't we all get along? :tongue:

Well there is no problem with the creator of mIRC making a few public appearances, havent you ever been in IRC for a game release or movie release? They are very exciting and generally alot of fun to be a part of for the short time they last. I saw the moderators replies to Necroman and didnt like what I saw here today, hes just asking, and its a good suggestion. Lay off and let a suggestion be just a suggestion, alot of of people use the program day in and out and are generally interested in Khaleds coding career with this application, is it so wrong. The worst part of this thread was the general feeling of " WE deal with people like you all the time" sheesh that guy Necroman has contributed to mIRC is so many ways, give him a bit more respect Cobra, whoever you are. Rant finished.

Well whether or not Khaled makes an appearance on IRC is basically his call alone...and Cobra does make valid points by how Khaled has far too many things that are going on in his life...But some people just dont understand people do have lives outside of "Chat" i mean whats the big deal if he shows up or not people get tired of discussing Star trek re-runs? Wait i take that back that was so stereotypical of me but anyways the comment about someone stating that People "Expect" him to show up ....some may say yes because they may be having problems with mIRC or whatnot and others may say no because it may not be important to them whether he shows up or not and another may think that for the people that ask about him all the time they ask the question..."Are you his daddy or something?" i say although everyone has their personal opinions here...i just think that this particular post has just about had everything that needed to be said and on that note....i say next subject! thanks for letting me be heard and whether or not you agree i have my opinions as well...