Here are some screenshots of SamSyn’s new “World Chat” feature.
While “World Chats” are by no means anything new, it will be new to There. We think it’s going to be a great way for people to:
- Find Each Other in World
- Find Activities in World
- Get help in the World
- Keep each other “Company” in World
I was always inspired by Glitch’s “Global Chat” because it was pretty consistently a fun, eclectic, and civil place to hang out. I’m sure There’s will be all those things, and more.
In the images below, the various links to Activities you see are AU-TO-MATIC : The system inserts those as various events/activities happen/occur in world. You can click on the links to be teleported to the event, or learn more about it.
SamSyn is currently testing this in QA, coming soon to a release near you!
I am so There 
#1 by Mimi There on 2013.06.05 - 4:08 am
Tried our new Global Chat this morning. I like it! No more are the days “I can’t find people” lol. Also this will be very useful for our new members who may be confused finding places and activities. Altho I tried it early my time, it should get real interesting later this evening. And of course I appreciate it is a feature we can turn on and off. The ignore button is also a great feature. 🙂 Thank you Samsyn, and all involved in this update!
#2 by karille on 2013.06.05 - 2:21 am
Nice to see something implemented into the world that has probably been on your list since the beta days! ‘tu to the team.
#3 by coolnet560 on 2013.06.04 - 5:27 pm
Some people have a Club IM group that they use for events, Would the Club IM be affected by it?
#4 by ImageMaker on 2013.06.04 - 3:54 pm
With (at the moment) about 75 people scattered all over There, something like this is virtually a necessity. I was just in (testing my Linux/Wine install — still not ready for prime time, with all the browser windows blank and compass not working) and a working global chat would have made it easier to find others…
#5 by Andrew Almeida on 2013.06.07 - 9:41 pm
Which of course will do little good if only 3 of those 75 people have it turned on at any given time.
#6 by Beth on 2013.06.02 - 5:23 am
This is great! Really gives everyone a chance to help eachother out.
#7 by Guernseyman on 2013.05.29 - 2:20 pm
Looks interesting and I hope should work very well, it will at least alert those who like to help new members (like I do) to know when some brand new member has logged on world first time. Global chat works very well on the other world I belong to, but I will not say which one that is apart from that it had a very bad tech crash late last year. It will be very interesting to see how people take to Global Chat, some people will love it some will hate it, but if I remember rightly there will be a option button so people can switch it off or on, I will have to look back on previous blogs by MW to see if I am right on that option button.
#8 by jimony on 2013.05.29 - 12:17 pm
Nice! This could be very helpful for a newb if there is FAQ answers to help questions they may ask and if it is on by default when they spawn.
#9 by Soledadnegativa on 2013.05.29 - 11:25 am
When can we expect to see this implemented in game?
#10 by imJonathan on 2013.05.29 - 8:26 am
Really think the usernames of avatars should be clickable to either IM, View Profile or add to buddy list?
#11 by imJonathan on 2013.05.29 - 8:34 am
(coloured in their name-tag colour would be cool!)
#12 by samsyn2 on 2013.06.01 - 8:47 am
At this point we are unable to ‘decorate’ the name field of the message. IF we could, we would definitely make the name clickable (to profile presumably as that would open up everything else), but probably not tint to nametag color (if only because not all nametag colors would be legible against a common background and I don’t think we’re emotionally ready to go all alternating background).
The problem with decorating the name is that the code already depends on an unadulterated name (I mean, jeepers, the name should at least be a little bit ‘bolder’ than the message, don’t you think?).. Anyway, it’s just a decision someone made early on in the implementation and it would take awhile to root it out and make data separate from visualization. One might also worry about the impact on drag-select, but you could make that argument against any hyperlinks in the window.
Anyway, not in Mark I World Chat.
Well, ok, I have to add that certain automatic “activity messages” like the announcement of an event starting, DO include an avatar name (the event host) and THAT name *is* clickable (tons of clickability in the MESSAGE, just not in the NAME).
Speaking of that, our intention is to release this (and other things) this coming week. In the case of World Chat, this first release will NOT turn it on automatically for *anyone* (it has a PEOPLE menu command to toggle it, as shown in those screenshots above).
Once we’re sure it’s working in the live environment (presently, there is some fear it might go crazy and stream infinite messages in the real world), we’ll make it pop up automatically for newbies… during the first few logins only (after which they, too, would need to turn it on manually).
We know the general technology is not scalable (for any world) if too many people try to use it at the same time, so we really don’t want to push oldbies into it automatically.
While I am meandering and digressing… This first release announces the start of ALL events. Which probably means a burst of activity messages at the start of every hour (or half hour) which might make the notifications less useful. If that becomes an issue we will probably add some sort of filter for that. The first filter that comes to mind might be to look at the EventHostSkill level of the event host….. (pauses for the collective outrage :-)…. but I think that is still all tied in to whatever solution we come up with for advertising upcoming events on the ThereCentral home page. (we need a semi-automatic system to populate that like the featured hoods section, where we magically cull the “most likely to be of interest” upcoming events for promotion at that level (presumably with the same overal ‘fairness’ decree where we randomly show one of N ‘peers’))
#13 by Andrew Almeida on 2013.05.29 - 7:01 am
I like the idea. I still don’t really see many people when I get on. I wonder will we be allowed to toggle the system messages on/off though.
#14 by samsyn2 on 2013.06.01 - 8:55 am
I think if you just want to chat (no “Activity Messages”) there are plenty of opportunities in the product for that already, so no, there is no option to explicitly suppress just the system activity messages. (but please see ruminations above about filtering, since neither do we want 30 activity messages a second streaming by!)
If you were asking, however, “Can I turn World Chat off?” then the answer is: “yes, plus you even need to turn it ON in the first place, unless you arre a super newbie)
#15 by soede on 2013.05.29 - 6:36 am
Exciting stuff! It will be interesting to see how this gets integrated and used in world. I hope people will be respectful and helpful, like they were in Glitch!!
#16 by samsyn2 on 2013.06.01 - 9:02 am
World Chat imposes the same language filter as other IM windows, and offers the normal IGNORE button, and I assume that people being nasty in that channel will expose themselves to serious moderation. But I’m wondering if it will be hijacked for sales purposes though. (as it was in World of Warcraft, back when they had a global chat channel). Can we just point out in advance that using bots to post in World Chat would be a quick trip to losing access to the World.
#17 by Drain on 2013.05.29 - 6:16 am
What SHE said. I especially like that it’s an option. Once the novelty wears off, I suspect a lot of ppl won’t keep it open. Over all, it’s a nice upgrade me thinks…’tu
#18 by Francis_7 on 2013.05.29 - 5:32 am
Can’t wait to see this in world!
#19 by blissboccara on 2013.05.29 - 5:19 am
This is super cool!
#20 by Mimi There on 2013.05.29 - 4:42 am
Very cool. Should help ALOT with those that are bored. As well as with new members learning where its all at! Cant wait to try it. Thanks