I log on once in a while to a channel I used to use, and some of the same people are sorta still there. IRC is weird now, nostalgic but also... the things that made it truly fun aren't really a thing. Weird !fserves for warez, strange early chat bots, a/s/l... I do miss it. I think it has moved on except in little bubbles, and I cheer those on from afar.

IRC doesn't have quite as many people because people have moved to computers that are not capable to keeping TCP connections open (smartphones). But there are good and active communities left in the ~400k people left IRCing.