There’s nothing like the feeling of finding a group of true friends, or a gang of like-minded people who share your interests and annoyances. If you love technology as much as we do at Ars, that feeling probably hit you at some point when you were online. Today the Ars staff is celebrating some of the Internet communities we’ve loved.

Sometimes an online group is just a place to bitch about work, and sometimes it’s a place to share your deepest secrets. Some of us found love online, and others found hope for the future of civil liberties. We gamed, we had deep discussions, we figured out how to prank dumb users, we talked about sports and science and digital surveillance.

And we’re still doing it here, in Ars comments and forums. These are our stories, but they are yours, too. Tell us about the online communities you enjoyed for a quick joke, or the ones that changed your life.