The concept of Filesharing (and digital piracy) has been around since before even the basic days of the internet – where floppy disks, and, even earlier, rolls of punch-paper, were shared at swap meets.

The Internet, as it is always keen to do, revolutionized filesharing in a big way. Bulletin Board Systems was where shareware began to congregate, where the very idea of the “scene” really began. Eventually, the Scene spread to Usenet, then FTP & FXP. In the late 1990's, IRC became the system of choice, as development in the DCC protocol made it significantly faster compared to other methods.

While Bittorrent stands out now as the be all end-all for filesharing, killing Usenet, and neutering the usefulness of services such as Napster or Nicotine, IRC and the DCC protocol still are actively used and developed; sharing files via IRC is still a viable way to find and download files – especially rare ones – that stays on par with modern expectations in speed.