The History of Chat Room
It's allowed a person in Australia to communicate instantly with someone in Alaska. It has been a means of staying in touch with family and friends in far-off locales--or in the next town over--and also has increasingly been a means of meeting new people. Chat rooms became popular with the dawn of the Internet, but actually were around about 20 years before the World Wide Web even came into existence.
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Early Forms
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One of the first forms of text-based chat rooms was through a program known as Talkomatic. It was developed by the PLATO System in 1974. Like today's chat rooms, it allowed for synchronous conferencing between users. In the 1980s, other chat room programs began cropping up as personal computers gained popularity. A format known as Internet Relay Chat, introduced in the 1980s, had different specialty channels to suit users' interests.
Early 1990s
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From their inception into the early 1990s, chat rooms were used by a fringe audience, and the service had not yet been a part of popular culture. That began to change in the early 1990s. At the beginning of the decade, a program known as Bulletin Board Systems was formed. Throughout the United States, there were local BBS system operators who would hold periodic meetings so BBS members could meet face to face. Users needed a modem and phone line to access the BBS. Unlike later chat rooms, the BBS was local.
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Dawn of the Internet
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In the latter half of the 1990s, chat rooms soared in popularity as American households increasingly dialed into the World Wide Web. Some of the earliest Internet providers, including Prodigy and America Online, offered chat rooms as part of their package of features.
Modern Features
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Chat rooms have advanced along with technology. While the earliest forms allowed solely for text exchanges, modern chat rooms allow users to enter an almost virtual world, complete with multiplayer online games and 3D or 2D environments that allow people to create their own characters. Other features for non-gamers include voice and photo features that can accompany messages exchanged. Web cams also can accompany chat exchanges.
Substitutes
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Traditional, text-only chat rooms, especially those using Internet Relay Chat, have declined in popularity. Users are relying on other methods, including instant messaging and phone texting, to communicate quickly and efficiently.
Chat Room Etiquette
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Since they were first developed, chat rooms have been known to have rules outlining what is and is not considered acceptable behavior. This is especially true in chat rooms designed for children. Generally, offensive language, hate speech and words conveying violence are among some of the behaviors that are not allowed in chat room sessions. Some chat rooms are moderated, and the person overseeing the chat room can ban a person from participating in the forum in the future.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit displaced365/Flickr.com An Internet chat room session
