care to chat?

That is the most common question when you enter any text chatroom. Its either that or A/S/L? (age/sex/location) or something along those lines. I started using chatrooms, like mIRC ( IRC or Internet Relay Chat is 'virtual meeting place where people from all over the world can meet and talk.') when i was 14. (what would be at least 12 years ago now.. how times have changed) and it was purely text based. Which was why when the argument today of how can something text-based be so powerful and influential, i seriously beg to differ.

I had friends (and myself included) who would meet people online and become friends (or more then friends in some cases) and this was exciting and scary at the same time. I have to admit, I was out of control when it came to chatting online. Its amazing to see how naive and easily duped we were, and this was only text! Chatrooms today have evolved in the sense that it has become almost real. Hence the meaning of 'virtual reality' to me is about making the user feel like they are there. Online communities like IMVU has tried to penetrate the 'virtual' chatroom boom.

The application IMVU allows you to create your 'avatar' and enter different rooms, which can be anything from Buckstars (their version of Starbucks) cafes to beaches and so on. It is based on 'old school text chatrooms' and you have catalogues to browse through for clothing, hairstyles, pets and even furniture. The text used within IMVU are in forms of speech bubbles. The power of this technology allows you to walk in and out of rooms, looking for friends or random people to talk to.

There is also the sense of an RPG ideology, where you use your mouse and keys on your keyboard to navigate around the room. Like i said, amazing! Basically, I am still amazed at how something I take for granted like talking to friends online has become something so 'technologised' and intricate. It looks like this will be the future of communication. Maybe we'll have super computers which will allow us to enter the chatroom, literally.

Joanne C