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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Feb 23, 2009 14:49:45 GMT -5
- Chat is wonderful! We love it. However some of us get frustrated that the chat periodically times you out -- if you don't type anything for a while. For some people it's 8 minutes, for others 15 minutes, for others 20 minutes, for some 30 minutes. It varies. For me, it's usually 17 minutes. It's not a big deal, because you can just re-enter chat immediately, as soon as you are ready. The issue for some is that you've lost all the chatscroll. So you go to wash some dishes, come back, and discover the chat disconnected. You log back in, and enter into middle of somebody's story. You cannot scroll back to see the beginning. The other person would need to start the story all over again for you, if she were willing to. So usually, I don't ask what I missed. That's not so bad if the person was discussing something unimportant. But if her story was about a cleaning crisis that she needed help with, it would be inconvenient. I would want to help, but be unable to scroll back to find out what's going on. Our chat software is plugged into Proboards and that works great. I like that you have to be a member here in order to log into chat. That's seamless. However, we have the FREE version of the chat. It has no options for changing the "timeout" timing. There was interest in chat today in PAYING for the EXTENDED version of chat. People say they'd contribute to part of the cost, if we could do it.CLARIFICATION: CHAT ACCESS WOULD BE FREE TO EVERYONE, but if people want to upgrade the software, then there we would need OPTIONAL donations to the cost of the upgrade -- and OPTIONAL DONATIONS to annual membership in upgraded chat.
ONCE UPGRADED, NO ADMISSION FEE, STILL FREE TO ALL.
ALSO .... once upgraded, there would be ONLY ONE CHATROOM with all the new features. Everyone could use the new features, whether they had donated or not. The extended version of chat would allow for more features, such as changing the timeout settings. The options are here: www.addonchat.com/features.htmlChanging the timeout settings is listed as "Optional idle timeout". Note that some versions have additional options, such as allowing each person to type in a different color. Some versions allow "chat avatars". Some versions allow us to add more sound effects. (Currently the free version allows only 3 sound effects: "meow", "whip", and "slap"). The prices listed are in United States dollars. Currency converter here: www.xe.com/ucc/- Question # 1: If you regularly chat, do you care about any of this? Is it important to you that we go to a more advanced version of the chat software?
- Question # 2: Is the "timeout" issue the only one that matters to you, or do other features matter, too?
- Question # 3: Do you think the extra features would just distract us from cleaning?
- Question # 4: If you want the extra features, which paid version do you think we need?
- Question # 5: If you want the extra features, are you willing to DONATE funds to the cost of one of the the paid versions of chat?
- No admission fee would be charged to anyone. All would enter chat for free.
- The OPTIONAL donated funds would be simply used to set up the upgrade and to pay for annual paid status dues.
[/blockquote] [/li][li] Question # 6: If we do raise the funds, who would collect them and handle the payment options? The mods?[/li][/ul] NOTE: I don't really have an opinion one way or another. But I was asked to post this message to see how much interest there might be. --- UPDATE: please vote in the POLL.
The poll is on Byways, here: takeonestepatatime.proboards80.com/index.cgi?board=other&action=display&thread=4207
Please vote.-
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Post by BC on Feb 23, 2009 15:45:28 GMT -5
Thanks for the great post CL! I think an upgade is a fab idea. Not only will it solve the 'timeout' issues that frustrates alot of us - it'll also bring more friendly fun things into chat. Tired of using the same sounds? You'll be able to sing like a bird with new sounds. Not enough emoticons (smilies)? - An upgrade would bring more and the choise to add new ones. You'd be able to do simple things such as change font colors. Which can be alot easier when alot of people are talking and you can't see who is typing what. Color can make things stand out. You'd also be able to add avatars that appear next to your name in the chat window. There alot of extra features that would be able to make chat a bit more user friendly and personal. I'm all for the upgrade. I'd also happily donate some money towards it. I'd also be happy to help out with any of the technical side of it because I have alot of experience with website and chatroom design and management. What do you all think? *EDIT* I've looked into some options for how the money could be sent and recieved. I have seen websites that have a box at the bottom of their website somwhere, where you can click to donate some money to help fund their websites.
I think that this could work here because we could just have a little box somewhere on the forums where people felt like donating, they could. Totally optionally. Somewhere descreat and not making it feel too in your face begging...
I think that we could do this VIA a paypal system. Which is free to use.
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Post by Ican on Feb 23, 2009 16:33:33 GMT -5
I prefer to have the chat room be free.
I do not want to pay to chat.
If others want to pay for more options for their self, that is OK.
But I hope if that occurs, that it will be optional, and that those who do not want to pay extra would still be able to chat.
Thanks!
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Feb 23, 2009 17:14:20 GMT -5
I prefer to have the chat room be free.
I do not want to pay to chat.
If others want to pay for more options for their self, that is OK.
But I hope if that occurs, that it will be optional, and that those who do not want to pay extra would still be able to chat.
Thanks! Oh goodness. I didn't explain well, did I? Sorry that I was unclear. I will re-write original post in this thread. I intended to say that chat would be FREE TO ALL ... but those who want extra features would need to donate funds for the upgrade. -
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Post by BC on Feb 23, 2009 17:19:19 GMT -5
I prefer to have the chat room be free. I do not want to pay to chat. If others want to pay for more options for their self, that is OK. But I hope if that occurs, that it will be optional, and that those who do not want to pay extra would still be able to chat. Thanks! It would still be free! It's only if people feel able to donate some cash, they can. If somebody can't or doesn't want to pay, they don't have to. It'd always be completely free to chat.
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Post by skatters on Feb 23, 2009 21:47:44 GMT -5
Maybe I am missing it, but the fees... are they monthly? Annually? Etc...
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Post by Ican on Feb 23, 2009 22:00:34 GMT -5
I intended to say that chat would be FREE TO ALL ... but those who want extra features would need to donate funds for the upgrade. - Thanks for clarifying that, Lioness! I appreciate your reply.
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Post by Ican on Feb 23, 2009 22:02:32 GMT -5
It would still be free! It's only if people feel able to donate some cash, they can. If somebody can't or doesn't want to pay, they don't have to. It'd always be completely free to chat. BecomingClearer, thanks for your reply. I'm glad to read that.
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Post by CourageouslyLion SeeksSerenity on Feb 23, 2009 23:20:30 GMT -5
- Maybe I am missing it, but the fees... are they monthly? Annually? Etc... Annually.The time period isn't on the features page. But on main page at www.addonchat.com/on the right side: As it says " starting at $80.00 per year", and that matches one of the prices on the "features" link here www.addonchat.com/features.html... I would therefore infer that all of the prices are annual fees.The 30-day money-back guarantee is nice, but it would be complicated trying to refund donations to each individual person who donates. Not sure what to think about that. --
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Post by skatters on Feb 26, 2009 8:22:23 GMT -5
After thinking about this some... for me, the chat is fine the way it is. Sure it would be 'fun' to have more options, but I think the payoff is minimum for the effort.
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Post by creativechaos on Mar 1, 2009 22:24:53 GMT -5
lioness, thanks for posting this, and the very clear options that we have. i think you explained it well and succinctly, and it's really cool that all would benefit if we did upgrade. i love fun features and would likely use them, but can see how it may be a distraction for myself and for others. that being said, i take full responsibility for my own poor time management . i work on various forums, and often go to chat to laugh, cheer up, have fun, and do some challenges. i feel willing to upgrade, but unattached to the outcome. if 80 people donated $1 each per year, the annual fees to the lowest platform of "paid" chat would be covered. that seems easily do-able. i would be willing to donate a few bucks, even being longtime unemployed. i probably fool around too much in chat, but i'm game for some new sounds, color fonts, things like that, if there is interest. the time out thing would be great if that were solved and more time could go by before we are kicked off, but it's a minor inconvenience for me. for those with dial up, this could make their lives a lot easier perhaps. regarding the moneyback guarantee, i suppose it could go into a fund to be used for any upgrades me might want or need, and that could be at the mods' discretion. i remember donating once to the ss boards and it felt good. the mods do all that they do for free, and it was a small chance to help out.
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Post by eagle on Mar 2, 2009 9:42:20 GMT -5
From what I read here, I see only one person more in favor than not. I see one person who would likely use the features, but doesn't really care what the outcome is. I see two people to whom it doesn't matter one way or the other. And I see one person who prefers chat remain the way that it is.
I do not see a conscensus to change chat.
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Post by BC on Mar 2, 2009 13:59:43 GMT -5
From what I read here, I see only one person more in favor than not. I see one person who would likely use the features, but doesn't really care what the outcome is. I see two people to whom it doesn't matter one way or the other. And I see one person who prefers chat remain the way that it is. I do not see a conscensus to change chat. I think that this thread is getting lost down here in the tech room. If it was in byways, maybe there would of been a better response.
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Post by Celeste on Mar 3, 2009 1:26:56 GMT -5
I think an upgade is a fab idea. Not only will it solve the 'timeout' issues that frustrates alot of us - it'll also bring more friendly fun things into chat. Tired of using the same sounds? You'll be able to sing like a bird with new sounds. Not enough emoticons (smilies)? - An upgrade would bring more and the choise to add new ones. You'd be able to do simple things such as change font colors. Which can be alot easier when alot of people are talking and you can't see who is typing what. Color can make things stand out. You'd also be able to add avatars that appear next to your name in the chat window. There alot of extra features that would be able to make chat a bit more user friendly and personal. Hi folks, Thought I'd join in the discussion. I actually use the upgraded Addon chat features for another forum, so I'm familiar with what is available and how it operates. Although I love it, there are a few misconceptions here that I think we need to address. We could add a handful of new sounds, emoticons and chat avatars to chat using the upgraded features. However, numbers of each is limited by the level of the upgrade. Using the next level, you'd only get 25 of each. That may be fine for basic emoticons and sounds. Clearly, that isn't enough to give a personal chat avatar for everyone. Even the pricey $400 option would only cover half our membership. How would we decide who got an avatar and who didn't? I think the best we could do is come up with 25 basic chat avatars and you could choose which one you wanted to use while chatting. It would not be exclusively yours, however. Is the gain of using a chat avatar, compromised at that, still worth the price? I'm also not sure how an upgrade would change the timeout issue. We don't have a problem with it in my chat room, but we don't have people walking away for long periods of time on challenges either. The fact that people have different lengths of time before getting logged out of chat makes me wonder if the current problem is partly a user browser setting. Collecting money for this wouldn't be a problem. The question is whether enough people want this upgrade enough to support it year after year. At this point, it doesn't look like it. I think that this thread is getting lost down here in the tech room. If it was in byways, maybe there would of been a better response. You can easily mention this thread in Byways, BecomingClearer, along with the URL of the topic. You might want to try it and see if more people show interest.
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Post by BC on Mar 3, 2009 5:42:13 GMT -5
I think an upgade is a fab idea. Not only will it solve the 'timeout' issues that frustrates alot of us - it'll also bring more friendly fun things into chat. Tired of using the same sounds? You'll be able to sing like a bird with new sounds. Not enough emoticons (smilies)? - An upgrade would bring more and the choise to add new ones. You'd be able to do simple things such as change font colors. Which can be alot easier when alot of people are talking and you can't see who is typing what. Color can make things stand out. You'd also be able to add avatars that appear next to your name in the chat window. There alot of extra features that would be able to make chat a bit more user friendly and personal. Hi folks, Thought I'd join in the discussion. I actually use the upgraded Addon chat features for another forum, so I'm familiar with what is available and how it operates. Although I love it, there are a few misconceptions here that I think we need to address. We could add a handful of new sounds, emoticons and chat avatars to chat using the upgraded features. However, numbers of each is limited by the level of the upgrade. Using the next level, you'd only get 25 of each. That may be fine for basic emoticons and sounds. Clearly, that isn't enough to give a personal chat avatar for everyone. Even the pricey $400 option would only cover half our membership. How would we decide who got an avatar and who didn't? I think the best we could do is come up with 25 basic chat avatars and you could choose which one you wanted to use while chatting. It would not be exclusively yours, however. Is the gain of using a chat avatar, compromised at that, still worth the price? I'm also not sure how an upgrade would change the timeout issue. We don't have a problem with it in my chat room, but we don't have people walking away for long periods of time on challenges either. The fact that people have different lengths of time before getting logged out of chat makes me wonder if the current problem is partly a user browser setting. Collecting money for this wouldn't be a problem. The question is whether enough people want this upgrade enough to support it year after year. At this point, it doesn't look like it. I think that this thread is getting lost down here in the tech room. If it was in byways, maybe there would of been a better response. You can easily mention this thread in Byways, BecomingClearer, along with the URL of the topic. You might want to try it and see if more people show interest. I should of made it clearer about avatars. Have been in chatrooms with them, yeah you can't get one to cover everyone, it's not a personal avatar, just a chat avatar. It's also a way to show your mood or whatever... and they also make things more pretty There is often people annoyed about the chat timing out. According to the website there is an option to change this with the upgrade. Happy days!
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