Fond Memories of Chat Rooms

Finally put my finger on why Twitter seems so fun: because it reminds me of the free MicroSoft Chat rooms we used to spend soooo much time in about 8 years ago or so.

Every night for hours, hanging out with webfriends ( ... real-live web "kin"? ... ) and building these whole communities where people would plan vacations together and web-reunions where everyone would meet at some central location for a few days ... very informal, just the plans that particular chat room "regulars" put together. Which became annual.

There were nicknames and emoticons and characters and hosts and passing the hammer (and dropping the hammer) and all sorts of goofy stuff. And all of it was free, and came pretty much to a crashing halt when they decided to convert it to a subscription service.

Because if it ain't broke, then by all means fix it. Pretty please.

Anyway, it was particularly shocking to me because my home computer had crashed and it took a few months to get it up and running again and I was so looking forward to reconnecting with my chatroom "friends" when lo and behold! The freaking thing wants me to pay!?!

Are you kidding?!? I will never pay for something I once got free (unless I really want it and there's absolutely no other way to go ... don't look at me like that, surely you've heard of "grandfathering"?).

So. After many long years of no chat rooms, along comes blogging ... great fun, but not real-time communication. And facebook with its various applications ... fun again, but not (oh, you know). And now Twitter. As close to real-time as possible without being a chatroom, no?

Not to jinx anything, but when do you think they're going to get around to chargin ... er, nevermind.