Originally, #lifeboat was started on EFNET a long time ago as a retreat for the regulars from #brits. Poor management of the channel, and personal differences between channel operators, made it a difficult place to be, with regulars taking sides with certain operators as arguments broke out. The reasons why #brits fell apart are largely unknown, and not important, but one afternoon after talking about it all with pahmie & eel, it was suggested to break away from #brits completely, forming our own channel, and the name #lifeboat was suggested. They agreed then that a philosophy of fun & friendship would be a key factor in the new channel, and the topic of "Jump in for fun, friendship, support & love" was suggested then, too. At that time, with the future of #brits still undecided, the idea was discussed, and put to one side.

A few days later and as a spur of the moment thing, whilst talking to bublbear one night, /join #lifeboat was typed and the topic set. No less than 5 minutes after joining the channel, and staying there on his own, the first ever visitor to #lifeboat arrived. Her name? Puds, who everyone got to know as Pudsie! At the time she was in need of a bit of support and a friendly ear, and the topic had caught her eye. And that was the moment #lifeboat was born. From there on, a few moments later, a gradual trickle of people arrived into the channel, at which time, one person not being able to handle talking to everyone on his own, bublbear was invited into the channel to help! Soon after that, with a total of around 10 people in the channel, all talking to each other and getting along well on their own, pahmie was invited into the channel. The amount of friendly people in the channel, all largely drawn by the topic, quashed pahmie's doubts that a new channel would be difficult to start, and with the right attitude, and philosophy it would be possible. And so #lifeboat was born from that day.

From then on, pahmie, bublbear, eel and others spread the word to their friends on EFNET, and a core group of people, them being: rip, heart, drogo, pahmie, eel, and bublbear formed the channels operator team. One who was lost in the shuffle was Jinnylyn, wandering around on IRC she was finally rescued by Pahmie and gladly jumped aboard and soon after that, a number of the regular visitors to brits made the jump into the lifeboat, following the good spirit and conversation! The orginal regulars from #brits, being Zus, Ryder1, JDH, Rapunzel and a few others. With the channels core of operators, and small bunch of good friends, a friendly channel was established where newcomers could find pleasant chatter with nice people, and so soon afterwards we began to gain more regulars. A few of those people being, suz21, patches, scarlette & nana.

A little while after the channel was established, came Blubeard. Our loving Robot. Kindly provided by eel, and his university. This heralded a new step forward for #lifeboat, as we were able to keep the channel open 24 hours a day, and maintain our list of operators. Through Eel's hard work with blubeard, we then had a play toy in the channel, and he proved to be quite popular for easing the tension in a channel when people are getting to know each other! Unfortunately Blubeard disappeared from the boat in late 1996, early 1997. Several rumours have been heard regarding what happened to him, and the one probably closest to the truth is that he met someone of like minded script in #bot_sex on Under.net during one of his excursions and was lured away into the WWW sunset. We wish him all the luck and maybe someday one of his children may reside as our channel bot.

A few weeks after #lifeboat was born, the problems associated with EFnet began to upset the channel somewhat. Because of EFnet's design, it's all to easy for someone to 'take over' a channel, and get in control of it, causing trouble and upsetting people by kicking & banning them, etc. And so Eel went in search of a solution. And the solution, was DALnet. Here they found a haven. A secure network, where a channel can be policed properly, and kept free of trouble makers. A place that will automatically make sure only the right people have op status in your channel. Soon after the discovery of DALnet, they began to open the channel on both networks. The intention was to move to DALnet, but with the regulars all knowing #lifeboat to be at EFnet, they had to make the move slowly. Within a few weeks, all of the regulars on EFnet knew that we have moved the channel to DALnet, and again, with an amazing amount of loyalty, they followed us to DALnet. And so here we were on DALnet, a small new channel amongst many.

With DALnet being so small when they first arrived, there were very few 'family' channels around, and indeed, very few popular channels at all. The group of regulars from EFnet, made the channel one of the busiest on DALnet, as soon as they arrived! And so, with a newly formed nice, "friendly" channel on DALnet, is wasn't long before they started attracting some more new regular people! Along with the core of regular people from EFnet, we added MNJulie, PoohBear, egil, GM, sillyhead, pitou and lots of others.

And so that is, in a nut shell, the history of #lifeboat. The channel would not be what it is, if it wasn't for the core of original operators, the original regulars who supported it through all the changes, and of course, the regular visitors here on dalnet. A very big thank you to you all.