Archive 1

I work for the America's Most Wanted Safety Center, a new department of America's Most Wanted getting away from the capturing of criminals, and branching out to all aspects of safety. I feel a link to our post about keeping kids safe online would be appropriate and mutually beneficial, particularly because an interesting video narrated by John Walsh is prominently featured. The link is http://www.amw.com/safety/?p=48 please consider it.

ALSO, we have a post about chat lingo that could be helpful to parents, or really anyone curious about chat lingo. The link is http://www.amw.com/safety/?p=35 please consider it as well. Jrosenfe 15:55, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

What is this, a promotion? 66.91.215.97 11:26, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

I believe this is a well intentioned attempt to be constructive, however Wikipedia is not a handbook, and so the links are not really appropriate especially for this article. Small sections on security/risks in online chat, as well as links to articles about online lingo are not a bad idea though, and fit in with the idea that this should be a super-article from which others like IM and IRC "branch off". I think this should be a much bigger article. (Though, off-topic, insisting on branding a "general safety" organisation with the AMW brand is pretty lame. America's Most Wanted Bike Safety?) - BalthCat 15:58, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Please visit Webx forum software, and help prevent this article from being deleted. i am trying to add some refernces. hopefully that will address any issues. thanks. --Steve, Sm8900 15:37, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

It does not appear to be a notable protocol. One of the references cited on that page doesn't even mention Webcrossing OR Webx. - BalthCat 16:10, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the section listing examples os Online Chatting softwares and sites. They serve only for spam and advertisement. Unless we can define a neutral criteria for defining which websites and software should be listed, we shouldn't be listing any (or otherwise we wouldn't have a reason not to list all. --Damiens.rf 18:55, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that we should remove this information, the article is well maintained and new spam can be dealt with as it gets added and I don't think we should be removing useful information to guard against an hypothetical scenario. About a defined inclusion criteria for entries, a mandatory wikipedia article seams to block advertising for now. - 83.254.215.235 (talk) 19:07, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

We're not talking about an hypothetical scenario. We're talking about the current state of this article. It's already full of spam. What's BobChatter? It was added by the sole author of the BobChatter article. What's Flickim? It was it was added by the sole author of the Flickim article. The same for Userplane. It doesn't seem the article is well maintained. Most of edits are by single-purpose-accounts or anonymous ips adding their pet-software. --Damiens.rf 19:40, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

You have a good point regarding the 'online chatting sites' section, I think this section is attracting the most spam at the moment and I don't have a strong opinion on keeping it. However, the 'software and protocols' section is a different thing. It has only a few relevant links (compared to e.g. P2P article) and I would say that information is lost if we delete it, especially since the article text is so short and readers could have a hard time finding related information. - 83.254.215.235 (talk) 20:01, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

So, I'm going to remove the 'online chatting sites' section right away. About the P2P article and about "information is lost if we delete it", please see WP:OTHERSTUFF and WP:LOSE. In the case you have more ground objections, just let me know. --Damiens.rf 20:44, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Please don't delete more information without establishing consensus. - 83.254.215.235 (talk) 21:26, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Consensus is made by arguments. Do you have any? --Damiens.rf 22:01, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

"The neutrality of this article is disputed" on the article page... is this still needed and if yes is there anything that can be done to improve it? - 213.115.160.83 (talk) 13:35, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes. What we need to do to improve it is to establish a neutral criteria for defining what is a "common chat program", so that we can keep the list spam free.

In the case we found out no such neutral criteria is possible, I would favor the complete removal of the list.--Damiens.rf 14:46, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

No it's fine as it is and I strongly oppose the deletion of the software list. The current list inclusion criteria is "wikipedia article needs to exist" and there is no problem of keeping the list spam free. I don't see the urgent need to define a "neutral" inclusion criteria or the benefit of changing it at the moment. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 21:17, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Of course we need a neutral inclusion criteria, since we're writing a neutral article. And if you want to make "wikipedia article needs to exist" your criteria, you should better create List of Online chat Softwares instead (since Wikipedia contains both "commmon" and "uncommon chat programs". --Damiens.rf 23:40, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

There already is a neutral inclusion criteria, no need to complicate things. You fail to explain the necessity and benefits of your proposed change, in the current state the article would benefit more from expansion than from formal theoretical improvements. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 00:58, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Here is an suggestion, how about the following inclusion criteria: Wikipedia article needs to exist, with at least one independent reference in the article (such as a neutral 3rd party website or RFC). This would be easy to verify for editors and keeps spam and short lived software projects from the list. We could also get rid of the word "common" and simply say "The following is a list of chat programs and protocols". Because with common programs we would just need to list the big five (IRC, WLM, Yahoo, Skype, Jabber) and can not provide diversity.... which I guess is the whole point of having this section. - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 08:30, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Can we solve this dispute now, more suggestions? - 213.115.160.72 (talk) 11:56, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I would go for creating List of Online chat Softwares and include only those with an Wikipedia article. --Damiens.rf 12:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Which list inclusion criteria would we use there? - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 16:03, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Only those with an Wikipedia article. --Damiens.rf 16:40, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed (however the list here would be my first choice), then the name should probably be List of online chat software? - 83.254.208.192 (talk) 16:59, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Article updated with list inclusion criteria, conflict should be solved. -- 83.254.214.72 (talk) 23:32, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

How about combing links to MUDs, MUSHes and MOOes and list only the first one? The terms are related and all articles are referenced in the MUD article. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 13:14, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I had not seen this term in my time online, so I was curious as to how widespread it is. I googled (yes, yes...) and the "Chattiquette" version had few results, the "Chatiquette" version had around 125k. Considering netiquette (which is primarily about chat, and boards) has 11 million results (if you add nettiquette) I would be expecting more results from chatiquette if it was a truly widespread term for chat-netiquette. For this reason I'm not comfortable with leaving this segment in the article, implying that it is "the" term for chat netiquette. Could some one fix it?

The term chatiquette is a variation of nettiquette and describes basic rules of online communication. To avoid misunderstandings and to simplify the communication between users in a chat these conventions or guidelines have been created. The chattiquette varies from community to community, in general it describes basic courtesy, introduces new user into the community and the associated network culture. As an example, it is considered rude to write only in UPPER CASE, because it looks as if your are shouting.

- BalthCat (talk) 07:26, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't agree with deleting the section and restored it. The term chatiquette has thousands of google hits (in various languages) and is around for over 10 years. It is not true that the term netiquette is primarily about chat. Netiquette originated earlier, there are overlapping but also different rules/guidelines for electronic human interaction. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 09:53, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I moved it to the talk page to be reworked, rather than deleted it outright.. "Chatiquette"'s google hits represent 1.2% of those of Netiquette. I feel the the passage as it is now presents "chatiquette" as more accepted/more used than it really is. For reference, google returns MORE hits for "zombie squirrel" (quotes included) than it does for chatiquette. - BalthCat (talk) 20:30, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

In fact... if you do an advanced search on Google, and explicitly require the results to be in English "chatiquette" drops to a mere 15,600 results. If you switch to German, you get 756,000 results. (Odd that this is below above the results given on a regular search...) So... despite appearances this appears to be primarily a GERMAN word, rather than an English one. :) - BalthCat (talk) 20:36, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

It is is your own research that this term is German (got any sources?) and not wide spread. In fact with thousands of Google hits the notability is given and I can't follow the deletion of the chatiquette section (see WP:NOTE). You can narrow down your search and look for "IRC chatiquette" or "MSN chatiquette", you will find many chat tutorials out there. Here is a reference that used "chatiquette" already in 1995 [1]. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 22:01, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

A thousand google results is not notable. In fact BalthCat has 1460 results. Google, in general, is not meant to be a tool for determining notability, even though editors frequently use it. Is the link you linked a notable guide? It doesn't appear to be.

Again, cheating and using Google returns 2.5 million results for English articles with the term "netiquette", and merely 15,600 with the term "chatiquette". That is 0.624%! If Chatiquette was a commonly used phrase for "chat netiquette" then netiquette guides would use the term more than 1% of the time! Google News also has no English results for the last 30 days and only 3 results, from the same webpage, from their ENTIRE news archives. It has 1500+ results from the archives alone for Netiquette! It MAY be a word used by English speakers, but it is NOT a notable one. - BalthCat (talk) 00:30, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

I have also just checked OneLook. OneLook is an aggregate dictionary search site. 12,771,461 words in 1080 dictionaries indexed. No result for "chatiquette" in 1080 dictionaries. Please provide evidence of this term's *notability* before replacing the segment without rewriting it. - BalthCat (talk) 00:38, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Quantity is indeed not a criteria for notability, I have added five good references. If we can't reach consensus here we need another opinion or arbitration. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 09:33, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Quantity being 0 certainly is a criteria for notability. I no longer even feel this has a place in the article, as it is an obscure word for chat netiquette. We will indeed need another opinion. - BalthCat (talk) 20:20, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

And somehow I think you had this feeling from the very beginning. ;) I added in total 7 references in English language (you deleted the moderated merriam-webster reference), and it isn't hard to find more references for German, French, Italian, Swedish to underline that there is no lack of propagation. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 22:48, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

German, French, Italian, and Swedish are not relevent here. And you are mistaken, I thought it was a corny-sounding unnecessary neologism before I started googling and realised it was, in fact, a RARE corny-sounding unnecessary neologism. Your sources still do not definitely demonstrate notability, considering they are still in a vast minority, and the Cnet article itself attempts to present GIWIST, HHOK, HTHBE as useful chat initialisms. Obviously some of this has not stood the test of time. However, since you have attempted to source this paragraph, I will not attempt to remove it, though I may find the energy to rewrite it to present chatiquette as an alternate word for chat netiquette. (Which is what I wanted from the beginning.) Unfortunately, I am lazy. - BalthCat (talk) 03:49, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

I would say this is your personal opinion. How hundred thousands of pages and a documented history of 13 years make a "rare neologism" is something that I had a hard time to understand from the beginning of this discussion. Sure, there are different opinions on how important communication guidelines are and perhaps the latest generation of chatters (MSN/AIM/QQ) don't see written down chat guidelines until they start chatting on e.g. a moderated social networking site. Since this isn't about an own article (but a subsection within the context of a chat article) I hope that notability and verifiability have been fulfilled. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 20:24, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

I specifically demonstrated that the word did NOT have hundreds of thousands of pages. Google returned less than sixteen thousand English pages. It is impossible to "source" something as "rare" except a lack of sources about it at all, it's like disproving the magical man in the sky. However, I will say that I believe it IS a rare neologism because in one thousand eighty dictionaries indexed at OneLook not ONE had that accursed term. I have a hard time understanding how you could have actually read my responses and still made that reply. - BalthCat (talk) 16:59, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Thousands of search engine hits should fulfill the notability criteria, I suggest to continue the discussion at Talk:Online chat. - 83.254.214.192 (talk) 00:02, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't fit the notability criteria. Bring that up on the discussion page for notability criteria, see how well that goes over. - BalthCat (talk) 00:23, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

1. A lot of IRC subculture is actually chat subculture, and can be found on Internet forums too. Should the discussion be here, with notes mentioning the spread, or should there be a Text-based subculture page? If so, might that link to Gamebook and Social software?

2. I've only put in a couple of references to cultural impact, hoping it can be expanded (and perhaps renamed). Note that a lot of cultural discussion is in Chat room: perhaps there should be discussion on what belongs where?

3. I've put a short list of quotes sites so they can have a home (which will probably move with Cultural Impact). I haven't put Qftw.net in as it's currently only a pretender. As for Bash.org, I'm guessing he's sorting out the bill for bandwidth of a recent DDoS, so it may return eventually.

-- Mark (talk) 19:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I had removed the list of links in October '08 [2] because it was nothing more than a linkfarm, per WP:EL, WP:SPAM, and WP:NOTLINK. --Ronz (talk) 17:02, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I think it's somewhat strange that QDB redirects here. There's no mentioning om "QDB" in the article. -- Henriok (talk) 19:45, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Could someone please show me where it states in the Bible , that women should not be ordained as pastors. I know about the chapter of Timothy as stating that women should remain silent.

                  Thank you

Why are you asking this on the talk page of the Online chat article? (NB: I don't believe pastors, regardless of gender, can be ordained through online chat :P ) ☻☻☻Sithman VIII !!☻☻☻ 01:47, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm a really big fan of whale sharks and I think it's really horrible that people post pictures of dead,chopped up whale sharks on the internet I think it shouldn't be allowed.

I mean like would you enjoy seeing pictures of your favourite animal being cut up on the internet?

Again ,I think it shouldn't be allowed

P.S.is there an age limit on wikipedia? cause i'm 11 and i was wondering if i am actually allowed on here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Whaleshark123 (talk • contribs) 16:48, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

First of all, I think you're at the wrong place; This is the talk page for the article on online chat. Secondly, I think there is a law forbidding people from posting pictures of animal abuse on the internet, though I'm not sure. And no, there is no age limit on wikipedia. Anyone can join, anyone can edit!

A word from the wise: Next time, try signing your post with four of these: "~" it automatically produces your signature. Happy editing! ☻☻☻Sithman VIII !!☻☻☻ 15:30, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

This person is arguing that the youth of the world may have too much freedom with what they can do or say with the almost endless possibilities that the Internet gives them, and without proper controlling it could very easily get out of hand and change the norm of literacy of the world. It easy to see that people are arguing that new technologies like online chatting can become an issue with people in society. Saying that people (mainly the youth) with no control may possibly be able to change the normal writing style. Is this a bad thing? In Guy Merchant’s journal article Teenagers in Cyberspace: An Investigation of Language Use and Language Change in Internet Chatrooms; he says:

that teenagers and young people are in the leading the movement of change as they take advantage of the possibilities of digital technology, drastically changing the face of literacy in a variety of media through their uses of mobile phone text messages, e-mails, web-pages and on-line chatrooms. This new literacy develops skills that may well be important to the labor market but are currently viewed with suspicion in the media and by educationalists. [12]

Merchant also says Younger people tend to be more adaptable than other sectors of society and, in general, quicker to adapt to new technology. To some extent they are the innovators, the forces of change in the new communication landscape. (Merchant, 2001).[13] In his article is saying that young people are merely adapting to what they were given.

When emails became first available people started to use that instead of writing traditional letters, because it was much faster and more efficient. The same goes with online chatting instead of having to call each person in a group of friends to try and organize a party, everyone can go online and chat with each other. It is much more efficient and less time consuming. People, especially the youth are learning to use technology to its fullest, and changing the way the world talks on the Internet. With proper education from schools, colleges, and universities there is no chance that the newly adapted Internet language will be able to change the change the proper language of the world.

Oh the irony. Honestly, this section is written so badly that it appears like it has not been written by somebody who is a native speaker of english. You can help by starting again from scratch. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.85.208.70 (talk) 12:56, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree. It is horribly written and appears to be an original rant. Needless to say, this is a popular, anecdotal criticism not shared by linguists. See Internet Slang. I suggest it be deleted in its entirety. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.60.31.245 (talk) 00:15, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree - it's still crap (at least the cited section). It could be good, in theory, if the points of people like "Merchant" were countered by those of linguists. Of course, I'm sure people have been lamenting the decay of language with every new medium that emerges. Hell, the Divine Comedy was worse than LOLs and all lowercase; it was written in the vulgar Italian instead of civilized Latin!

Boozinf (talk) 06:51, 29 May 2010 (UTC)

Totally agreed, and it would be verging on original research if it wasn't so much made up of bar-room opinion. The Yowser (talk) 15:55, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Is the article image really necessary? It looks like a school paper 201.250.57.134 (talk) 20:01, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Hey

I think what this section tries to reference somehow is memes / 4chan??? Maybe it should be taken out or just refer to those pages instead. Synergee (talk) 01:42, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Anyone have thoughts? Cause I am going to make some moves hereSynergee (talk) 23:14, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Do we have any source to start making a comparison page? Of course the main article on the topic is Comparison of IRC clients; for non-IRC chats I was linked to https://blog.okturtles.com/2015/11/five-open-source-slack-alternatives/ which seems to focus on a specific niche (Slack look-alike's). Nemo 13:44, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

This page needs to be updated - neither Whatsapp nor Kakao are mentioned (the two top Android chat apps) CapnZapp (talk) 11:35, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Also, iMeetzu and Brevly are not mentioned for online chat sites. 01:33, 6 September 2011 (MDT) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.45.69.14 (talk)

😊 Txinan (talk) 18:08, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

Surely Gitter should be listed as a chat service? I would have added it but I didn't know which category it fitted under. Best wishes. RobbieIanMorrison (talk) 21:15, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

F16 Ifka 5 (talk) 19:38, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

I've created a Wiki Page for a Regional Bengali Movie "Sesh Chithi". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sesh_chithi. I've also add 4 reliable sources Link which were published in the local newspapers on digital mode. Going through the on Wikipedia link for movie "Sesh Chithi" message is posted on my page going to be deleted on 3rd August because lack of reliable independent sources. This is a regional Movie having coverage in local newspapers only. These links for the article are verified.

Request you to enable the Wikipedia content of "Sesh Chithi". Also request to guide on the further course of action. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aparajita Majumdar (talk • contribs) 11:19, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

Milosz Krasinski (talk) 10:08, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Please update reference nr5

from

"UITS - Instant Messaging Chatiquette - University of Arkansas". Uits.uark.edu. Archived from the original on 9 June 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2012. The link is broken and westies does not exist

to

http://www.bbc.co.uk/webwise/guides/about-instant-messaging

BBC - WebWise - How do I use instant messaging (IM)?

Thanks Milosz

Question: Why exactly do you want this changed? jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk) 15:40, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

When you go to References Please see

"UITS - Instant Messaging Chatiquette - University of Arkansas". Uits.uark.edu. Archived from the original on 9 June 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2012.

The link is broken https://web.archive.org/web/20100609181704/http://uits.uark.edu/policies/index_4017_ENG_HTML.htm

One of the closest replacement is this resource

http://www.bbc.co.uk/webwise/guides/about-instant-messaging

So instead

"UITS - Instant Messaging Chatiquette - University of Arkansas". Uits.uark.edu. Archived from the original on 9 June 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2012. 

in references, please update to BBC - WebWise - How do I use instant messaging (IM)? http://www.bbc.co.uk/webwise/guides/about-instant-messaging

Is this now clear and crystal? Hope it does help. Thank you :) Milosz — Preceding unsigned comment added by Milosz Krasinski (talk • contribs) 16:31, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Done jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk) 16:48, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

At present, "Live chat software" redirects to this article. I don't believe this should be the case - live chat software for businesses to facilitate communication with their customers via their website, versus websites whose sole purpose is to connect people to chat online, are very different. Thoughts? Kayejchapman (talk) 22:53, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

43.228.111.102 (talk) 13:04, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. L293D (☎ • ✎) 13:08, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

My school has a lot of bullies there what do I do Shelbyd32 (talk) 21:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

It seems that these two articles address the same things, but that the other goes into greater detail of one aspect. -- MCG 20:25, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Both of the articles are kind of poorly written, so there might be some benefit to doing a thoughtful merge. But I think the terms Online chat and Chat room really do refer to different things. Online chat can refer to any kind of real-time text-based communication. [[Chat room]]s are one kind of online chat, and the other major kind is Instant messaging. There are also some more technical, jargon-laden articles that could be merged here. Online discourse sounds a lot like Online chat, and a Synchronous conference sounds a lot like a Chat room. -- Afolentes 20:41, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

-->== Information on IP banning someone from chat ==

Hi, I'm looking for information on how a permanent ban can be implemented in a chat room? There doesn't seem to be any information on the wikipedia page. I understand that you can ban someone by IP address... but can the user not simply call their ISP and receive a new IP address?

Hi Vineetcaring (talk) 15:50, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Uuiiii Shelbyd32 (talk) 21:24, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Hi Vineetcaring (talk) 15:52, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

F 16 Ifka 5 (talk) 19:37, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Hii Sure kha gupta (talk) 18:15, 3 June 2019 (UTC)

Can't we move it to past predictions? Because as always are religious predictions wrong over here in my country it's 22:36 pm June 9th so. MeMike123 (talk) 20:36, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

@MeMike123: This page, Talk:Online chat, is for discussing improvements to the Wikipedia article about online chat. You should have posted at Talk:List of dates predicted for apocalyptic events, I think. However, another editor has already made the edit you've suggested here. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:45, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

I have a feeling this listing is once again redundant with similar listings in similar articles and even with Category:On-line_chat as such. was about to fix the alphabet and add missing candidates, but is it worth it? Ha! And now somebody even added Meetro TWICE. SPAM! SPAM! --lynX — Preceding undated comment added 18:11, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Request to add meetcafecito as a software for online conversation. Their website can be found here https://www.meetcafecito.com/ and is dedicated to creating conversations over the internet. It fits well within the context of this page. Add this software to the listed software, please. Otirenmedia (talk) 19:07, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

It's not a notable product – Thjarkur (talk) 20:17, 6 January 2021 (UTC)