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LIVE CHAT??
Joined: Jul 2005
Posts: 153
From: The couve in Washington
RE: LIVE CHAT??
like they said, do it, and if it takes away from the forum then scrap it, no big deal right? Hell I've been having to PM LEVIII back and forth, with a chat room it'd be a hella lot easier, theres my two cents...
Joined: Jun 2005
Posts: 14
From: Seattle, Wa
RE: LIVE CHAT??
Patrick,
Over the years some of the busy BBS's and Forums I have been on, added chat, some chats did pretty much kill the message bases or forums, most didn't. The ones where the message base started to fall off, either limited chat to certain hours of the day, certain days days, or certain user levels... some just got rid of chat altogether, and most of those that got rid of chat after the users got used to it, are history.
But I have a feeling that your users are of the type that would use both chat and message bases. Chat for the quickie questions, but mainly to just hang out with friends in chat, rather than on the boards, for their day to day howdy what's up type stuff. Leaving the boards for the more general helpful info.
The one good thing about chat, is that on top of general random chit chat, you can schedule chats for all sort of topics, things like, Q&A, guest speakers, DYI's with pictures and video, if planned properly, etc.
Now you can allow chat to be free to all users (if the cost of running the chat servers is being taken care of by the advertisers), or offer a user level (paid that allows for chat, after a free month or so of chat). I mean no sense in offering something that ends up costing you money every month, until you have to run yourself into a hole and have to discontinue it. I've seen that happen to a few Forums and or Sysops, trying to be nice guys and eating the costs of certain things until they couldn't any longer.
Over the years some of the busy BBS's and Forums I have been on, added chat, some chats did pretty much kill the message bases or forums, most didn't. The ones where the message base started to fall off, either limited chat to certain hours of the day, certain days days, or certain user levels... some just got rid of chat altogether, and most of those that got rid of chat after the users got used to it, are history.
But I have a feeling that your users are of the type that would use both chat and message bases. Chat for the quickie questions, but mainly to just hang out with friends in chat, rather than on the boards, for their day to day howdy what's up type stuff. Leaving the boards for the more general helpful info.
The one good thing about chat, is that on top of general random chit chat, you can schedule chats for all sort of topics, things like, Q&A, guest speakers, DYI's with pictures and video, if planned properly, etc.
Now you can allow chat to be free to all users (if the cost of running the chat servers is being taken care of by the advertisers), or offer a user level (paid that allows for chat, after a free month or so of chat). I mean no sense in offering something that ends up costing you money every month, until you have to run yourself into a hole and have to discontinue it. I've seen that happen to a few Forums and or Sysops, trying to be nice guys and eating the costs of certain things until they couldn't any longer.
Senior Member
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 446
From:
RE: LIVE CHAT??
word Remmy. my sentiments exactly. i feel chat is a great idea. it will give us post ****** a place to talk with like minded people with similar interests. only reason i used to post ***** was because i was bored as hell and wanted a place to chat. i feel the chat would not take away from the boards in anyway. we could have the boards for technical matters and the chat for just that. it would eliminate alot of post whorage and put the chat where it belongs.