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Online chat tips and advice.Whether you are new to online chat, or just looking for some advice on how to enjoy our chat rooms to the fullest, our advice and tips below should help. Identifying staff members Quick icon guide
Staff members always appear at the top of the user list and always appear in green. If they do not appear in green in the main user list, and are not at the top of the list then that user is not a genuine staff member. For added peace of mind, you can view the complete list of staff members at any time. To start chatting, enter a chat name of your choice, and click 'Connect' . Your chat name must be unique from other chat names that are logged into the chat room. If you are required to enter a password, a pop-up window will appear where you can enter your room or user password. If you like, you can reserve and password protect your chat name for a small annual fee. The more creative and original your chat name the better. Remember sexual or offensive chat names are against the site rules, and will result in you being ejected or banned. Initially your chat name is your entire online personality. When you are new to certain chat rooms people do not know you so just like in real life, first impressions will count. Offensive, common or unimaginative chat names will not stand out in the crowd. Take some time to think of a great chat name which will make you sound interesting to others. When you first join a room, take a few minutes to sit back and see what the general topic of conversation is. Other chatters involved in conversations are not going to stop and want you to get involved if all you do is jump into a chat room and say something like, "Hi, anyone want to chat?". Gauge the feeling of the different personalities in the chat room, make comments or chat about the current subject being discussed and you are far more likely to be welcomed into the conversation making the rooms more pleasant for everyone. Try to reduce the time you spend in private chat as this will often exclude you from the communities in each chat room. Chat messages posted by all users are displayed in the main chat window. To add to the conversation, type a message into the text input box located below the main chat window, and click on the Send button (or hit the Enter key on your keyboard). Just above the text entry box to the right of the quick icons you will see a display of the users who are currently typing, but have not yet submitted their message to the room. Private chat is there for you to speak to a specific chatter without anyone else being able to view what you are typing. Private chat can be antisocial; you will find far more enjoyment in the public chat rooms where you can share your time and discussions amongst many different users. Chat rooms are no fun when the majority are in private chat, and this only leads to a cycle where in the end a chat room becomes obsolete due to everyone chatting in private. Please be aware our Chat Guides cannot monitor private conversations - some chatters will use this to their advantage by trying to engage in offensive chat or otherwise breaking the site rules. You can obviously report abuse to us, and even prevent private messages altogether. More information is on our safety advice page. You should always ask a user via the public chat room for permission to send them a private message. Once you have that user's permission, there are three ways to initiate a private chat with that user:
You may choose to ignore all private message requests from under the Options menu. Alternatively, when a private chat request is initiated, you may click on the Ignore checkbox under the Action menu to block other private message requests from that specific user. You can ignore any user in a room so that their chat text does not display in your own chat window. The ignore feature also block any private chat messages from that user. To ignore a user, right-click their name from within the user list, and select Ignore. Any ignored user will appear "greyed out" in the user list. To unignore a user, right-click their name from the user list, and select Unignore. You may ignore as many people as you wish. If you wish to leave the chat room click on the When in a chat room, do not repeatedly type the same thing over and over again or keep entering text into the chat rooms in quick succession. This forces the chat room to speed up to keep up with your typing. This disrupts the rooms by pushing other peoples' messages off the screen quicker and making the chat harder to read. This is called 'scrolling' - a form of disruption which is against the site rules. Text does not have a 'volume control'. In chat rooms, when you type in CAPITAL LETTERS it is considered shouting. Whilst you may feel the need to shout every now and then it is, just like in real life, considered rude most of the time. Always ensure you are typing in lower case unless you really feel the need to shout. If this is the case, please make sure it is a rare occurrence. Finally, before sending another user a private message you should always seek their permission first via the public chat room. Sending private messages without asking first is considered rude, and will not start your conversation off on a good footing! Unfortunately there will always be a small minority of people with nothing better to do than try to spoil your enjoyment of our chat rooms. The last thing you should ever do is retaliate or lower yourself to their level. We offer lots of advice on how to deal with chat abuse and advice on our chat safety advice page. Perhaps the most daunting thing for new chatters is the huge variety of coded letters which appear in a chat room! You will come across a variety of chat abbreviations and chat slang in the chat rooms and we have listed some common ones below. We could never show an exhaustive list - if you come across slang or abbreviations which leave you mystified - ask people in the rooms what the term means or approach a Chat Guide. Most people will be more than happy to lend a hand - they were in your position once, too! Emoticons - Turn your head to the side and with a little imagination, 'emoticons' show basic pictures showing a face of emotion. They are commonly used to convey feelings which are not obvious in simple text. (((name))) the brackets are 'hugs', the name in the middle is who they are for! Abbreviations - Used to save time when typing but can seem like a different language when new to chat! Here are some of the most popular. ASL = Age/sex/location We hope this tips section has helped. It should be said that the majority of chatters are friendly people who are always willing to help out those new to online chat. Our Chat Guides are there to help as often as possible - should you need any help or advice please do not hesitate in approaching them; that is what they are there for. If you need further help simply ask, speak to a Chat Guide or try our message boards. Good luck, have fun and stay safe. |
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Click this button to display a status message next to your chat name in the user list
Click this button to open the chat room in a separate window. This separate window can be resized and moved about on your screen. Close the window or click the 
button to return the window to the page. The default size of the floating window is 75% of your screen. Drag a corner or edge to resize it. 
Click this button to be sent back to our help index.
If you wish to leave a chat room, click the 
button or close the page.