The scent of nostalgia is potent with MSN Messenger (16 Photos)

MSN Messenger was released on July 22, 1999. For years it was the scene of cringe-worthy admissions of love, top secret conversations, and everything else in-between. Messenger stopped existing completely in 2012, and since then, kids have been using text, Facebook Messenger, and like, WhatsApp to get in touch with each other.

Kids today will never understand what the OG emojis looked like. Oh yeah, and the ways in which you could send them in “code” (k).

Look at how clean and early 2000’s this is! Remember the sound that rang out whenever someone logged on?

Who could forget the default Display Pictures (or DP’s) were?

Getting creative with your display name was great, but then you’d always have to check to make sure you’re chatting up the right person by checking their e-mail.

Everyone had the power to appear offline. This meant you could ignore certain people without looking like an ass.

“Yo, I’m appearing offline but we can still chat.”

You could put emoticons on your status to represent certain things. For example, when Steve Irwin died in 2006, every one put a turtle emoticon as their status.

Before the “three dots of doom” that lets you know someone is typing on the iPhone, this is what used to appear on Messenger. “So and so is writing a message.” And we all know the fear of watching that linger on for far too long.

There once was a time where you’d ask people for their MSN rather than their numbers. You’d then rush home and add them, but wait a little bit before messaging them as to not seem too eager. That wasn’t just me. Come on.

Not only could you set your status as whatever song you were listening to, you could also send songs to your friends. Only… it would take like 3 hours per song.

Then there was the moment where you’d ask a friend if so and so was online just in case they blocked you.

Creating emoji shortcuts was also an option.