Chat Rooms: A Pioneer of Communication

Eric Higginbotham
DTC 375: Language, Texts, and Technology
Dr. J. Farman
4/9/2009
Word Count: 931

Chat Rooms: A Pioneer of Communication

When I was growing up, I was fortunate enough to have a computer readily available for my explorative needs. In my eyes as a twelve year old, I had to be entertained constantly. My father had the remedy. I can remember the first time that my dad introduced me to the new member to our family: a computer. Shortly after this the words “America Online” and “Chat Rooms” became a term that was thrown around the house way too much to not be important. My father was certainly fully embracing this new type of media. It was an emerging technology that my dad was fascinated and completely consumed by. The idea of being connected to a huge network opened up possibilities that, I bet, could never have been thought of, by the majority, a decade ago. My father’s new playroom would eventually draw me into the same state of fascination that he was plagued with. Chat rooms became an amusing yet different experience that interested me. Although chat rooms are still available, I don’t visit them as much as I did when it was popular. Chat rooms did manage to create an interactive medium that helped develop other forms of media into what they are now. Simply put, chartrooms were the first stepping stone for the widely successful and popular social networking sites that are engulfing the world today.

Chat rooms played a significant role for the “online experience” that were offered by the emerging early internet services of CompuServe and America Online in the early 90s (Stone). The computer, at that time, would take what seemed like forever to boot up. Then it would take an additional ridiculous amount of time to connect to the Internet and of course the addition of the annoying high screeching noise of the connection provided the “cherry on top” (I say this because broadband has spoiled me over the years). It was worth the wait to go online and have a conversation with a friend, relative or even a total stranger across the world, or perhaps down the street, for that matter. This was a new interaction that had many people shocked at the fact that this type of communication was publicly available. It gave the people an individual identity that could flourish around the world.

After fully accepting all of the benefits of this god sent communication tool, I found out that some pretty deceptive people existed out there in the cyber world. I remember that many people didn’t quite represent themselves truthfully. The kid that I thought was my age started to sound like a different person…an older person. Then my parents started to see some disturbing news about these innovative chartrooms. Men and women were trying to exploit children to sexual acts or child pornography. It’s disgusting and sick that there are people out there that are targeting our children. Sites that have taken a step into more of a secure environment have created a barrier to this type of criminal behavior.

Sites like MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter allow people to learn more about an individual before they take that first step of contact. It’s still possible for predators to create deceptive profiles, but it at least makes these predators “jump through hoops.” MySpace gives the option of creating a private profile and Facebook defaults a newly created profile to be private. Facebook, which was developed in 2004, has represented itself as the safer social-networking site. Generally, Facebook has gone to greater lengths than rivals to keep a distance between adults and young adults (Stone).

Chat rooms have started the social networking craze that’s still spreading like a wildfire today. Over the years chat rooms have transformed into instant messaging. Instant messaging then had jumped mediums from the PC to mobile phones. Instant messaging is working at full force through our cell phones. It’s also revisiting our computers with the addition of social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter (I wasn’t even aware that chat rooms still existed until attended class within its parameters). These sites are now trying to configure other types of interactive media. Currently, Vivaty, a startup venture, has been quietly working for the last two years on a new technology that utilizes chat rooms. Of course, these chat rooms are no longer the traditional style. Vivaty is creating 3-D virtual chat rooms that can be added to social networking sites such as Facebook (Stone).

It’s evident to see that the loosely secure chat rooms that CompuServe and America Online endorsed in the early nineties, is the forefather for the successful and addictive, more secure social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter. Not only was it the foundation for these sites, it’s now emerging once again in a new format. By the sound of it, the addition of the revamped chat rooms and other features will only fuel the addiction of the daily visits that the majority of us are so familiar with. As we continue on this road of innovation it’s hard to say what we’ll come up with next, but whatever it is we have to pay homage to the chat room for pointing us into the right direction.



Works Cited
Stone, Brad. “New Scrutiny for Facebook over Predators.” The New York Times. 30 June 2007. 8 April 2009. .

Stone, Brad. “Online Chat, as Inspired by Real Chat.” The New York Times. 31 March 2008. 8 April, 2009. .