Chat

[thalbergmad]

I say bosses, the gold membership sign up page says the following:

"One year of unlimited access to all Piano Street content including Piano Forum and chat"

Does this mean there is a chatroom for Gold members only, or is this out of date??

Luv

Thal

[nilsjohan]

There is no chat room anymore so we need to update the membership description on that page. Thanks for pointing this out!

[sashakissin]

Is the chatroom closed permanently?

[retrouvailles]

I really think chat should be brought back. It would even be nice to set it up on mIRC, which is easiest for most people, rather than that buggy one that was in place before. It might even be nice to appoint more mods so that Nils and Henrik aren't overburdened with it.

[chopinmozart7]

Yes i totally agree. We need a chat room to make PS more "living"

[go12_3]

Yes i totally agree. We need a chat room to make PS more "living"

Ha!  Ha!  Ha!  That will be the day!   

[john11inc]

I have an extremely stable (we've had 500+ connections at once with zero lag), feature-oozing, beautiful PERL chat my friend and I wrote that I will give to PS to implement.  Just say the word.

[retrouvailles]

The problem is that the admins here want a chat program that they can completely control and log every conversation that goes on there. They probably got rid of it because it took too long to sift through the conversations, looking for any bad stuff. They also want something they can censor, also. Things that are controlled by other people cannot have all of those features, so, well, I just don't see chat returning.

[stevebob]

I don't believe that anyone who's not an administrator can know what the administrators want.

[retrouvailles]

I don't believe that anyone who's not an administrator can know what the administrators want.

I have been here long enough (my profile says 2007, but I've been here since 2004) and have experienced the chat room long enough to have an idea of what they want. Also, I am an administrator at another forum, so I have experience with this sort of thing. I might be wrong, but I at least have a good idea because of the experience I have.

[john11inc]

The problem is that the admins here want a chat program that they can completely control and log every conversation that goes on there. They probably got rid of it because it took too long to sift through the conversations, looking for any bad stuff. They also want something they can censor, also. Things that are controlled by other people cannot have all of those features, so, well, I just don't see chat returning.

Electing moderators does that.  I think that is so self-evident that it can't be the issue.  I think the issue is that a select few people always beg for the chat, and then when it actually shows up, nobody ever uses it, so they don't think it's worth the extra bandwidth to keep a chat around that nobody is actually using.  But I think that a lot of people would use the chat if:

A- the chat room was actually functional, for once, and

B- the site integrated the chat more, instead of it just being some tiny, off-handed link at the top of the page.


EDIT- I'd just like to state that even if jre is right, the chat I have can do all of those things extremely easily.  In fact, it already logs non-private conversations right now.  Word censoring takes about five minutes, and electing moderators, administrators and room-specific moderators (and sub-room-specific moderators; we actually have four classes of administrator for the chat) is as complicated as inputting the forward slash command /admin [name].

[lelle]

An idea that I've seen on other sites is to use the chat as a shoutbox (or a real, functioning chat) that is visible on the same page while browsing the forums. That way more people would use it if it's visibly active and visible while they're browsing the forums as usual.

[thalbergmad]

I say, that sounds like fun.

[retrouvailles]

The shoutbox works really well in the forum I'm part of that uses it. It's right there in front of you on the mainpage without having to click on anything, so there is no excuse to not use it, other than flat out being antisocial.

[birba]

What forum is that, Retrouvailles?

[stevebob]

The shoutbox works really well in the forum I'm part of that uses it. It's right there in front of you on the mainpage without having to click on anything, so there is no excuse to not use it, other than flat out being antisocial.

There are certainly reasons other than "flat out being antisocial" for not using such a feature.  If its use is elective, one shouldn't have to make an excuse for not participating.

[retrouvailles]

There are certainly reasons other than "flat out being antisocial" for not using such a feature.  If its use is elective, one shouldn't have to make an excuse for not participating.

Must you always take everything so seriously? I was being facetious.

[stevebob]

I honestly had no idea you were being facetious!  I admit I do assume people are serious unless there is some cue or clue to the contrary, and I really didn't detect one here.  Anyway ... mea culpa.

[oxy60]

I think that with a participation over 24 time zones, it would be difficult to have a lot of people in the chat room at any one time. That seems to have been the case when we had the chat room. When I was on this site, there was never anybody in the room.

[thalbergmad]

My experience was slightly different.

When I entered there were lots of people, but they quickly left.

Thal

[birba]

I was always afraid to go in. To me it's sort of like the back room in a pick-up bar... 

[oxy60]

When I came online today there were only 6 other users and when I posted my previous reply there were only 16 others online. Maybe there is a peak period when there are enough folks to have a nice chat but it isn't when I look.

Speaking of back rooms, Birba, is Fiddler's still open? In the late 70's that was quite the spot.

[go12_3]

I don't know what the hype is about the chat room. 
 Really, not many did use it unless there wwas someone in chat to keep the conversations going.  I know I used to visit the chat room often in early 2009, and there were always someone there, however, then there are the silent ones that just enter in and quietly leave without a word.  It's hard to talk with several people at once, but there are private messages that you can converse while everyone is chatting away.  This forum used to be friendly and
I met many here, but now they disappear.  We have to keep in mind that this is only
an Internet website where people do come and go as they please.  And yet there are
those that DO stay here and keep active in this forum.  I don't know how successful
the re-opening of the chat room would be, because of participation or the lack therein. 
We tried to have a moderator at the peak times of the day, but that fell through.
I think we can be intimidated by a bunch of people in a chat room, but once you enter and dive in and start talking about something, it's a skill that one acquires. 

[lelle]

I don't know what the hype is about the chat room. 
 Really, not many did use it unless there wwas someone in chat to keep the conversations going.  I know I used to visit the chat room often in early 2009, and there were always someone there, however, then there are the silent ones that just enter in and quietly leave without a word.  It's hard to talk with several people at once, but there are private messages that you can converse while everyone is chatting away.  This forum used to be friendly and
I met many here, but now they disappear.  We have to keep in mind that this is only
an Internet website where people do come and go as they please.  And yet there are
those that DO stay here and keep active in this forum.  I don't know how successful
the re-opening of the chat room would be, because of participation or the lack therein. 
We tried to have a moderator at the peak times of the day, but that fell through.
I think we can be intimidated by a bunch of people in a chat room, but once you enter and dive in and start talking about something, it's a skill that one acquires. 

This is exactly why I think an integrated chat that is visible whenever you browse the forums or even a shoutbox where your forum name would be your avatar would be great. The old chat was disencouraging to use because you would have to click a lot of links to open it and when the separate window had loaded there were rarely people there for that very reason.
If the active chat was visible at any time you were browsing the forums it would pique your interest and if a conversation was active you would instantly see that and be just one click away from adding your own comment.

[birba]

When I came online today there were only 6 other users and when I posted my previous reply there were only 16 others online. Maybe there is a peak period when there are enough folks to have a nice chat but it isn't when I look.

Speaking of back rooms, Birba, is Fiddler's still open? In the late 70's that was quite the spot.

The Fiddler's Elbow, you mean?  Yes, it's still there.  Sort of touristy - more international than Italian.  Wasn't aware there was a back room there...!   

[retrouvailles]

Why no input from Nils after all this?

[nilsjohan]

I am indeed following the discussion with all your interesting comments and suggestions.
It was a matter of fact that the old chat was not used enough to legitimate its existence, but as lelle and others suggests, one of several reason could have been the somewhat cumbersome system we used.
The idea of a shoutbox on the main forum page is a good one. We will look into setting it up for evaluation.

Johan

[oxy60]

I know this is off topic but..

The Fiddler's Elbow, you mean?  Yes, it's still there.  Sort of touristy - more international than Italian.  Wasn't aware there was a back room there...!   

Yes, there were several. It happened that when they were setting up they found a door and opened it. In fact they could have continued right into the catacombs. However they stopped. It became a question of getting enough fresh air back to those rooms.

Thanks to our fellow posters for putting up with a little reminiscence about ancient Rome.