What would it take to get you into a IRC channel?

Tek7

Tek7

CGA President, Tribe of Judah Founder & President
Staff member
The CGA and ToJ have had IRC channels on GameSurge for years, but they've been desolate for several months now. IRC channels offer a great way to chat with other community members in real time, especially when you're unable to talk on TeamSpeak (say, when there's a 7-month old baby in the next room and you need to be quite).

Promoting an IRC channel in 2011 may be a lost cause, but I don't know of any alternatives with the same level of control or features. (Steam Community Group chat is great, but there's still no mass invite feature and inviting 20-30 of your Steam friends to a room involves far more clicking than should be necessary.) TeamSpeak is awesome, but IRC is better suited to idling and popping in and out and chatting for a few minutes at a time.

You don't need to use an IRC client like mIRC or a chat client with IRC support like Trillian.

You can just click here, enter a username, and click Connect.

And if you have an Android smartphone or tablet PC, you can install a free IRC app. Here are three:
  1. AndChat
  2. AndroIRC
  3. Yaaic
I'm guessing there's at least a few free IRC apps for iOS (iPhone, iPod Touch) as well, but I don't own any Apple products and didn't see a way to browse the Apple App Store on a PC.

If any Mac or iPhone/iPod Touch users could post names of trustworthy IRC apps, I'd appreciate it.

If you use Firefox, you can install and use the ChatZilla add-on.

So what will it take to get you into #cga?

On a related note: Is anyone able and willing to run a trivia bot for #cga? I miss blackgravity's trivia bot.
 
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I have stayed away from IRC after being the recipient of numerous viruses while in IRC rooms. Even if the environment is friendly, I would still not go.
 
i like irc but its usually kinda boring :(
 
CajunGeek said:
I have stayed away from IRC after being the recipient of numerous viruses while in IRC rooms. Even if the environment is friendly, I would still not go.
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I'm not sure what IRC client you were using or which network you were on, but I've never had an issue with malware or viruses on IRC. I'm not saying there isn't legitimate cause for concern on other networks, but I've never run into shenanigans on GameSurge.

Atown said:
i like irc but its usually kinda boring :(
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XionTawa said:
^^ this
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It's only as exciting as the people who join the room make it. :)

IRC channels are like game servers: No one wants to be the first or second person in the channel, but people are far more likely to join and keep returning to an active IRC channel.

Trouble is, it takes at least a few regularly active people to make the channel active. Most people new to IRC join a channel, say hello, and leave if no one replies in 10 seconds. That's not how IRC usually works.

IRC channels are, with very few exceptions, not active 24/7. Regular IRC users tend to idle in a channel and pop in and chat when someone else starts chatting. I'm only in #cga when my laptop is on and I have Trillian running my Tek7 profile. But if someone drops in while I'm in channel and says hi, I'll switch over to that window and chat if I can.

I think a trivia bot would draw more people to #cga, but I've been trying to delegate the few technical responsibilities I have left as President of CGA and President of ToJ, so I'd rather not pick up any new projects to manage.

If someone else would like to run a trivia bot, just let me know.
 
What would it take to get me into IRC? A miracle. For personal and paranoia reasons I avoid most chat and social networking like the plague. TS is my only current exception for live chat.
 
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well..... im in..... and no one is there...........
 
I am totally unfamiliar with IRC - so a good reason to use it would be more or less what I would need.

So a few curious questions,

TeamSpeak is awesome, but IRC is better suited to idling and popping in and out and chatting for a few minutes at a time.
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Why? Why separate everyone? Can't the chat part of TS3 be used for those that can't chat outloud? We had a good convo going the other day with someone who couldn't use the talking feature but could listen in via headphones. It was a very active conversation while in game. It worked pretty cool. The person that couldn't talk would just type his responses. (Of course, he typed them in game, but I didn't know there was a chat feature in ts3 until the staff meeting the other night lol)

Is the IRC channel game specific, like in ts3 or is it more like a general chat?

Don't see myself using it personally.
 
Atown said:
well..... im in..... and no one is there...........
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Sarugon said:
I'm sitting all by myself in the IRC channel, more people need to get on. So what are you waiting for?
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I'm only in the IRC channel when my laptop is on. I usually don't get on for more than a few minutes at a time until the evenings, after my wife gets home and has an opportunity to spend time with our daughter.

My hope is to find a few people who use desktops that are on 24/7 (instead of laptops) as their main machine and can idle in the channel. If people see others in the channel, even if those others are idling when they join, they're more likely to say hi, stick around, and wait until someone sees the flashing window (or whatever visual or aural clue their program of choice delivers) and replies.

Abea said:
Why? Why separate everyone? Can't the chat part of TS3 be used for those that can't chat outloud?
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TS and IRC can run simultaneously. Neither client (at least on a modern Windows PC) takes much processing power or memory and each medium has its advantages and disadvantages. I certainly wouldn't want to take away activity from our TeamSpeak server; I'd scrap the IRC channel before doing that.

Abea said:
We had a good convo going the other day with someone who couldn't use the talking feature but could listen in via headphones. It was a very active conversation while in game. It worked pretty cool. The person that couldn't talk would just type his responses. (Of course, he typed them in game, but I didn't know there was a chat feature in ts3 until the staff meeting the other night lol)
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I've been in TS channels in similar situations and I agree it works great. But there've been times I couldn't listen to everything being said in a channel or I've had to step out or I wanted to listen to music instead of anyone (regardless who it is) talking. IRC is better suited to those situations than TS.

I want both the TS and IRC channels to be active. I want the CGA to have active real-time community (TS, IRC, IMs, in-game interactions) as well as "turn-based" (forums, PMs).

Abea said:
Is the IRC channel game specific, like in ts3 or is it more like a general chat?
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General.

Abea said:
Don't see myself using it personally.
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Aye, and I'll admit it's not for everyone.

At least, not until we get a trivia bot up and running. Because trivia contests in an IRC channel are so much fun.
 
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