Astrology is a good strategy for use on internet forums for deciding who you should align yourself with, especially when you don't actually understand what is going on.

That happens, but I think it has to do with the phase of the moon (and maybe tea leaves).

I know for a fact that McAfee AntiVirus blocks IRC (tcp port 6667) as it is sometimes used as a protocol for botnet communication. AFAIK there is no way to disable it.

We really would like to see...

I'm also experiencing the problem. Firefox 1.5.0.3 on Linux.