Dealing with users in chat, can sometimes be laborious, problematic, or just down right frustrating... Well this blog should help you in that area, I've gathered some nifty tips and tricks that will hopefully allow you as a chatter to chat better, and be able to keep a calm, cool, and respectable manner when chatting.
Getting Onto Chat[]
- Okay, in the navigation bar of wiki, you can go to the tab that says "On the Wiki". Move the mouse over those words and then move the mouse to the text that says: "Chat".
- Now, this method of getting into chat is for the use of chat hacks: In the right rail, go to the box that has all of the user avatars in it, click on the button that says "Join the Chat". This will get you into chat and activates your chat hacks.
Using Chat[]
You can go to the bottom left hand corner of your browser's window. Your browser is what you are viewing the wiki and the wiki's chat with. Once you're at the bottom left corner of the chat window, you should see the avatar for your account. To the right of your avatar picture you will see a blank box, left click into the box, type something meaningful and hit enter.
Right above the box where you typed a message and sent it off, other user's messages will appear in a feed like format. The newest messages appear at the bottom of the message viewing window, which is just above where you type messages. :D
You can left click on a user's name, which are in the right side of chat in a list with an avatar next to their user name. Once you left click on the username, your browser will pop up a small window with the following information. The user's edits on that wiki, the month and year that they joined, their message wall or talk page, their contributions and below the button for contributions, there will be a link with the text: "Private Message". Clicking the private message button brings you to a special chat with just the user that you clicked private message for. To get out of this, click on the wiki's Word Mark on the right hand column of chat, this will bring you back to the main chat.
Chatting[]
Well, now we get to chat, it's always a good idea to ask for a link to the chat guidelines, or, possibly hunt down the chat guidelines for that wiki, for yourself. Make sure you read the rules carefully, because not every wiki has the same chat guidelines! Chatting should be a fun experience when you follow the chatting rules, sadly though, that's not always the case... Before we get to addressing chatting better, let's cover a few things I consider good personal guidelines for chatting on new chats.
Find and read the chat rules for that wiki. Places that might be a good idea to look for chat rules would be: "Project:Chat", "in the wiki-navigation", or in the "Category:Policy".
If you cuss normally, don't cuss at first on a new chat, because if you disregarded #1 then you may find that you either in trouble, kicked, or even a short ban for cussing. A bottom line to this, a personal for me, is that you can find words that are more descriptive than a cuss word. Like my father always says, "If you write a song and cuss, you've shown me how little talent you really have. It takes true talent to write a song, and to speak without cussing." To add to that, you will always be able to find other words to fill your vocabulary. c:
Do not insult other users:
This is a really fine line, because even though you may be a joking person in real life, other users over the internet don't know you as well as your friends know you. Text is black and white, or whatever other color the text is on the chat you're on, that aside, text doesn't really have any meaning unless you know the person who wrote it. Because at the moment, I could be entirely sarcastic, and you won't even know it.
A really important thing to remember, is that people interpret things in different ways. What might be offensive to one user might not be offensive to another user. Another thing about people interpreting things, is that unless you make it extremely obvious what emotions you're trying to convey with your text, users will give the text a feeling according to what they think.
Here are a few simple things to remember when other people's toes get stepped on:
You might not always be right, if you're wrong, be willing to admit to it, it makes chatting easier for everyone else, and it makes you look like a much better person. If other users ask you to stop chatting about a topic, it's usually a good idea to stop chatting about that topic.
The Golden Rule (Wikia Style): "Treat other users how you wanted to be treated." Racial slurs, and dirty puns can be offensive to some users, possibly making them uncomfortable If you read the rules for the chat, you will know when it is a bad idea to tell puns or use slurs.
If someone accuses you of something, try to take it to PM if possible, you don't want a small problem to snowball into a huge one!
Is Chat Dead?[]
If chat seems dead, guess what! Chat isn't really dead, because every user has the ability to contribute to the chat's liveliness. Ask what they’re up to, ask how everyone's day went.
Do you have a favorite book, movie, game, plaything, podcast etc? Guess what, any of these things can be great topic starters! All you have to do is ask, "Hey, does anyone like Spiderman?" Maybe even ask, "Has anyone heard of <insert a book and author here>, I really liked it!" Well maybe don't be as lame as me and ask about Spiderman, but hey, even Spiderman can start an awesome chat conversation!
If chat seems dead, don't spam! Spam constitutes, a lot text (like if I pasted this whole thing into chat, that would be spam), ASCII art, randomness that takes up tons of messages, and links that are pasted into chat repeatedly. Because of that spam is a major fender bender area, giving it many different forms, and is sometimes not noticeable unless blatantly obvious.
A User Insults You[]
If a user insults you, let it go: It's better to let something go, than it is to hang onto the insult and possibly disrupt chat. If you feel that you can't let the insult go, private message the user. That way the problem doesn't disrupt main chat and chat can continue flowing. If the user begins to insult you in PM or continues to insult you in the main chat, feel free to private message a moderator about the situation.
Listen to the moderators[]
It might not seem like the mods have your best interest in mind... If this is the case, then you are most likely trolling, spamming, harassing other users, or something else that is not good for the chat room setting.
Chat Mods should always have the chat's rule based integrity in mind: This means that if a chat mod sees a user that is not following the rules, the chat mod has the community given right to reprimand and punish the user if necessary.
If you feel that a chat moderator has wrongly given you a warning or kick, then feel free to private message the mod that gave you the warning, and politely talk with the mod about your warning/kick.