Announcement


We regret to inform everyone that as of Sunday November 25th, UKChat will be closing its doors permanently.

We.ve had a really truly amazing time over the last 10 years. Starting its life running from our house in London, the UKChat server has been through a great deal. From the power tripping out whenever someone wanted to boil a kettle to grinding to a halt because the fan had accumulated too much dog hair, the poor server has hosted 10 years of fun, laughter, tears, relationships, marriages, babies, friendships and love.

So why have we decided to close the site after all this time? There are a number of reasons.

The site has grown and sustained a large number of users over the years and although our statistics show that those numbers are not shrinking, they are not growing. In order to grow and revitalize the site we would have to put in a large amount of time and effort and finance and we simply don.t have any of those resources.

Another main contributing factor to the decision to close is that we feel that the time for chat sites is over. 10 years ago they were one of the only ways to communicate with friends in real time online and we were there at the beginning and we were the biggest in the UK, something we.re very proud of. Today, Social Networking sites and Instant Messaging are where it.s at. For those who are interested in joining, we.ve set up a UKChat Group on Facebook . the world.s largest social networking site . where you can keep in touch with each other once we.ve closed.

Lastly, some people may know that I recently moved to the West Coast of the USA and had our 3rd baby. Life here, 5000 miles and an 8 hour time difference away from London, is wonderful and completely hectic! To devote any quality time to UKChat, especially time when everyone in the UK is awake, is near impossible. I feel that without my full undivided attention, to continue to run the site is the wrong thing to do. I cannot take responsibility for a site that I can.t give any concentration to.

We are sad that we are putting UKChat to sleep. You can.t put 10 years of effort into something and not feel some regret. But she has earned her rest, it is time to put her to bed. Please use the next week to say Goodbye to the site, enjoy its final hours, and leave us some nice messages on the message boards.

To all the people who have visited the site over the years, thank you. And a special thanks to all of the people who have hosted for the site, without you we wouldn.t have made it to 10 years, your time and efforts have been appreciated very much. Lastly to those who gave not only their time to host but even more time to manage the site, we couldn.t have done it without you Adz, AJ Ali, ^Andy^, Andrew, Angie, Artemis, Av, Beast, Belinda, Ben, Bound, Champs, Cheech, Chris, Demon, Dinks, Dobs, Doo, Femmy, Freya, Gary, Gemini, Gizmo, Graham, Grandad, Helen, Homer, Jan, Jase, Kells, Kenna, Kim, Kimbo, Kizz, Lis, Maggie, Manx, Medic, Medusa, Moodz, Peeka, Pete, Pooh, Reaper, Rebel, Robbo, Rolly, Salli, Simes, Simon, Sky, Speccy, Steve, Sue, Surf, SwissLe, Titanica, TudorRose, Vera, Virgo and all those I have no doubt forgotten to add here whom I hope will not hold it against me, THANK YOU.

Goodbye for now.

Katie Jones

Also on behalf of Gareth Jones and Neil Sedley