Do you assign a negative connotation to the term "chat room"? (1 Viewer)

[KeithH]

I spent a couple days at my parents' house recently, and during parts of my visit, I logged onto the HTF. At one point, my mother asked me, "What do you get out of those audio chat rooms?" The term "chat room" struck me odd, but I suppose the HTF could be considered a chat room. The term sounded odd to me in the context of the HTF due to a negative connotation that I have assigned to "chat room" over the years. Without trying to spark undue controversy, when I hear "chat room", I think of news stories on web sites where people seek to meet other people and where some parties involved are underage. To me, "chat room" conjures up the image of sites where acts of, let's say, questional intent or motive are occurring. Is it just me? Do you view the HTF and related sites as "chat rooms"? I call them "message boards". To me, "message board" implies legitimacy. Maybe it is just me.

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

Well, technically, this is a "forum" or even a "bulletin board". We compose messages, usually putting some thougt into them, we post them, we come back in a couple of hours (or, in some cases, minutes) to see who has responded. Chat rooms are, pretty much by definition, live and instaneous, like the live chats here. (Except chat rooms are generally unmoderated or poorly moderated.)
Personally I don't "do" chats, except the ones here when I can. I always think of them as the world's most boring cocktail parties, with bad spelling, worse grammar and annoying acronyms added to the mix. A least when I'm being bored by a drunk at a party I don't have to put up with his bad typing. Most people I "met" in the few chats that I tried before giving it up as a bad business must be dreadful conversationalists in real life, because they type the most boring nonsense most of the time. (When they've typed it clearly enough for me to read it.) The time lag and the constant cross-conversations don't help any.
The beauty of a forum like this one is that I can read and post whenever I have the time. I'm not tied to someone else's schedule. And we have terrific moderators. (Never miss a chance to suck up to them. )
Regards,
Joe

 

[Jack Briggs]

Yes, Home Theater Forum is more appropriately referred to as a "discussion board" or a "message board."

Chat rooms are limited in scope, and the "conversation" is forgettable. Real time or no, I have little use for chat rooms.

 

[KeithH]

Joseph and Jack, thanks. That's what I thought. If my mother ever refers to the HTF again as a "chat room", I will most certainly correct her. I can't tolerate such blasphemy.

 

[Leila Dougan]

I don't consider chat rooms to be negative, though they most certainly are different than message boards. I find that people who know little of the internet use "chat room" to describe all of the above, and more. My mother also refers to all forums and message boards as "chat rooms" and my constant corrects seem to have no affect.