Today I am going to discuss chat rooms and forums, if you couldn't tell from above.
So, first, what are chat rooms and forums? Well, I'll start with chat rooms and then go on to the more advanced discussion medium of the forum. So if you don't know already, a chat room is a medium for simultaneous communication via one more methods of communicating. For example, one chat room may enable you to converse textually with many people at the same time, another might let you use a webcam to actually converse vocally and/or use body gestures. Most chat rooms let you converse using text based communication, by itself or in addition to other forms of communication. Take Skype for example, it allows you to converse using any of the three simultaneously, but you don't have to have a webcam or microphone to communicate. Chat rooms are great things for communicating for businesses and gamers and many other groups, but one downside to a chat room is that it's literally like talking to a room, everybody hears what you say, there is limited ways to talk directly to one person or another, which is where the @[insert name here] custom started, and Skype somewhat fixed this by letting you personal message (PM) someone.
Now take forums on the other hand, which are based on the same principles of open communication and discussion. Forums are slightly more constricting in that they are not simultaneous, as it takes a short amount of time to post each response, and in addition it is restricted to only text based communication. One benefit to using a forum is that you don't have to log in to the forum to see the posts, many times you do have to log in for posting, but not for viewing. A contrast between the two is that forums are entirely online when many times chat rooms use software that has to be bought or downloaded to use. In addition, forums can be set up to have each message moderated before it is posted as opposed to messages being removed after they are posted, if they are moderated at all in a chat room. Another contrast is that messages posted in forums are archived and will stay there for a long time, as opposed to a chat room which has everything deleted after every conversation usually.
I have mentioned moderators and moderation several times now, so I will attempt to give a short explanation of them. A moderator is someone who knows and understands all the rules of the forum/chat room/etc. and is usually an officer or an appointed position rather than an earned or elected one. What a moderator does is they examine posts and topics, and if these posts or entire topics do not follow the rules, then they either delete the posts/topics or they drop the mighty banhammer on the poster(s) who are abusing the rules and kick them out.
So chat rooms and forums are great things, right? Well, yes, they can be used to learn or teach incredible things. Teachers sometimes use them in online courses to teach their students. I have used forums many times to find out how to fix computer problems and programming issues. There are many incredible uses for a forum or a chat room, but unfortunately this is where trolls come into the picture.
A troll in reference to online forums and chat rooms is not a Norse mythological beast, nor is it attempting to catch tuna. An internet troll is someone who performs the act of trolling, which is to say or do things to provoke a usually negative reaction from somebody. This should not be done. By being a troll you are pushing people away from each other, being divisive, causing breaks in the system of communication, and to do this you have to ignore many of the rules of internet courtesy anyways. Finally, being a troll is basically like being an anarchist, and if you haven't reasoned it out yet, the only way anarchy will work is if it is tru, and that is only possible in a singular human society. If you can't figure it out for yourself, comment or email us and I will give you a special weekend post this sunday explaining it. Rule number six, don't be a troll. In anything, video games, chat rooms, forums, any medium for conversation, don't be a troll. Nobody loves you if you are a troll. The first and last rule for dealing with trolls is this; rule seven: don't fight a troll, answer a troll once with a clearly defined thought pattern for why you believe what you do or sufficient proof, kindly, to the contrary, and if they still fight back then they truly are a troll, ignore them. Totally ignore them. The moderators will take care of them or they will get bored. if you show that you are annoyed at them then they will never stop and you will have defeated yourself.
well, I am going to skip rules eight and nine today because the work in better with the next few topics, but I am going to give you arguably the most important rule for internet courtesy, which I have already referenced in my past post on video game courtesy, which is this; rule ten: better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. To be thought a fool is nothing, I have been thought a fool many a time, many of which I truly was, but I know people who do open their mouths and remove all doubt of them being a ignoramus. this should not happen, it's really easy to be quiet.
Of course the previous rules one through five still are important for forums and chat rooms, as are six seven and ten for video games.
Thanks as usual for listening or not, comment if you desire, or not. The rules are being compiled as it goes and will be ready by the end for the final post. If you have any questions, please feel free to comment or email us at our new address, maybe you can be the first to email us.
Farewell and Valedictions,
The King of the Blog
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