…and this is a 
Would anyone be interested in a Pharyngula chat room?
Category: Administrative
Posted on: October 20, 2006 11:50 AM, by PZ Myers
So I got some email a while back about this free and easy to use web-based chat room service…and heck, it's so simple I thought I'd give it a whirl. Here's a link to a Pharyngula chat room—try it out and let me know how it goes. I'll plan on checking in myself now and then, but don't wait up for me, talk among yourselves.
I will definitely plan on popping in at 8pm Central time tonight (Friday), if you really want to yell at me online. We'll see how it goes; I don't know how well it will hold up if ten people are trying to converse at once, and I also notice that there doesn't seem to be any way to authenticate identities, so it's not clear to me how much noise will be generated.
Comments
No authenticated identities So we can all pretend to be you - BWAH HA HA HA.
Posted by: Toni Riga | October 20, 2006 12:07 PM
Here's one where you don't even have to create a chatroom:
http://gabbly.com/scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/
It also has no authentication, however. It also might not work with Opera (or so I've heard).
Posted by: August Pamplona | October 20, 2006 12:32 PM
It's pretty chaotic in there.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | October 20, 2006 12:33 PM
Sweet zombie Jesus, like I don't waste enough time on this website as it is.
Posted by: Joshua | October 20, 2006 12:59 PM
Would we have to have squid sex chats?
Posted by: craig | October 20, 2006 1:08 PM
Chaotic, and I'm completely chat-stupid, and I didn't even get to say hi to Rev. BigDumbChimp n'folks--got sidetracked somehow...and I think people were laughing at me...though it was hilarious when Dembski showed up.
Posted by: Kristine | October 20, 2006 1:13 PM
Maybe "Dembski" and "Behe" will get into a huge fight over where Cain got his wife.
Posted by: Kristine | October 20, 2006 1:15 PM
It's nice, but an IRC chatroom on a real network would be better. It's a little bit harder to access than simply typing in a webpage (unless you use a web-based IRC applet), but the overall number of features are much, much better.
Posted by: Cyde Weys | October 20, 2006 1:32 PM
Thanks for posting an AJAX-based chat app., PZ! I hate it when it requires flash, which means I have to turn on javascript and configure FlashBlock to allow it. Oy vey.
Posted by: Aerik | October 20, 2006 1:56 PM
Why not use IRC? IRC clients tend to be more reliable than browsers, and most networks do have authentication.
Posted by: Cairnarvon | October 20, 2006 2:15 PM
Why not use IRC? IRC clients tend to be more reliable than browsers, and most networks do have authentication.
Hmm. Because a) web developers don't like things that they can't bury in the web page (not that this is impossible, but it would still work like crap using Javascript, not to mention incompatibilities due to wrong versions, JScript verses Java, etc.) and b) too many people are too fracking stupid (at least from the stand point of the average user going to chat rooms) to either install something like mIRC or correncly type in the commands to authenticate themselves (never mind do so automatically).
I think that about covers it. lol
Seriously though, if its not Flash or script, web sites don't want to deal with it, which is why places like Google and Yahoo have "groups", which they keep changing the behaviour of to make them a pain in the ass to use, instead of "gasp!" using age old and 100% functional news servers as well. Don't improve the "existing" technology, just invent an entirely new one, that gobbles extra bandwidth and stops working right every other week because they decide to change something...
Posted by: Kagehi | October 20, 2006 3:12 PM
Ok! It got nothing to do with the chat room, but maybe this is worth some space on PZ's blogg...
Christian Right Lobbies To Overturn Second Law Of Thermodynamics http://www.theonion.com/content/node/28308/print/
"This is America," said Duane Collins, a Gatlinburg, TN, distillery operator and father of five. "And in this country, we have the God-given right to change laws we don't think are Christian. We are united in our demands that the second law of thermodynamics be repealed, and our voice will be heard no matter what. That's just a plain fact, and nothing anybody says can ever change it."
It's an old article, but I'm just amazed! Are they still trying to do this?
Posted by: johan | October 20, 2006 3:24 PM
Ooops! It was a joke! And I totally fell for it! I'm 100% f*cking stupid.
Posted by: johan | October 20, 2006 3:32 PM
alas, poor Johan...
are you really unfamiliar with The Onion?
satire, son...satire.
Posted by: CCP | October 20, 2006 3:33 PM
"are you really unfamiliar with The Onion?"
Not anymore! ;)
Posted by: johan | October 20, 2006 3:42 PM
try to establish some forum instead via a popular address/hoster that is known to be frequently indexed by google, so any lost child that wants to find the latest on human`s apocalyptic annihilation gets an earful of an easier comprehensible scientific rationale first.
Make sure you embed the latest 10 posts or so via some javascript as a sidebox on this page, so the forum can quickly catch on.
Posted by: lo | October 20, 2006 4:02 PM
"satire, son...satire."
Satire or...
...PROPHECY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: johan | October 20, 2006 4:13 PM
It wouldn't be hard to add authenticating identities. I must have programmed stuff like that a bazillion times and probably so have half the people who read seed. :)
Posted by: plunge | October 20, 2006 4:14 PM
DEFCON (Campaign to Defend the Constitution) is having a chat right now about the book "Religion Gone Bad."
Posted by: Kristine | October 20, 2006 4:18 PM
Speaking of chat. This is amusing...
GOP 2.0, Instant Messaging to Victory!
Posted by: Steve_C | October 20, 2006 4:56 PM
people who read seed
Spermatomancy?
Posted by: HP | October 20, 2006 5:03 PM
I second that... PZ, PLEASE use IRC... It's a standard protocol and anyone can connect to it with the client of their choice instead of keeping a browser window open all the time. I have quite a bit of experience
Posted by: Derek Rodgers | October 20, 2006 8:11 PM
Loved the chat room but maybe FORUMS/BB is more what you need? So many conversations, many people typing, confusion! And my bad bad spelling did NOT help.
I like the liveness of it, where I know they are online and we get to respond RIGHT NOW but a Forum would let there be more longterm and segreated in to topics communication.
But you would totally need a moderator:D
Posted by: marsha | October 20, 2006 9:02 PM
I like the chat, but there are some serious lag issues, and it's not just me. I think IRC would be better.
Posted by: Claire | October 20, 2006 11:03 PM
Why would people want to use IRC? It's clumsy and generally the interfaces are ugly (yes I know they can be tweaked).
Posted by: Kristjan Wager | October 21, 2006 2:06 AM
I went there briefly, but I thought it was very chaotic. It was hard to tell who was responding to who. And I know everyone wants to be polits, but if all 25 people in the chatroom say "bye" to someone who's leaving that takes up a lot of "chat space". I guess I prefer the blog format that keeps responses organized by topic (more or less).
Posted by: maqita | October 21, 2006 10:02 AM