How To Not Be Awful: A Guide To Internet Relay Chat

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crazyhedgehog

haha what
Greetings, my fellow community members! I'd like to take a minute to address the current situation of our wonderful IRC channel #srb2fun. It seems as though the general quality of conversation has degraded severely as of late, and I would like to try and make an effort to fix this.

Now, I know I'm not everyone's favorite user, and I often come off as quite a jerk. However, I'm going to try and be as civilized as possible here for the better of my fellow man. With that out of the way, let's begin!

Well! It seems as though you've stumbled across one of the many wonders of the internet! #srb2fun on Espernet! Congratulations, because your discovery here has proved to your peers that you have the intelligence to log onto the dinosaur known as IRC! This is why we're leaps and bounds above the Romans and Egyptians! (Forget the difference in thousands of years, that's smalltime)

First, let's take a look at the topic!
srb2funtopic.png

Neat! You may be greeted when you enter, and it's entirely appropriate to greet everyone back! Everyone likes a happy hello! At this point though, you've got a few options. You can

A) Metaphorically vomit onto your keyboard, and type the first thing that comes to mind.
B) Wait for a minute or so to get a feel for the current conversation and be able to participate

Option A has quite a bit of appeal. Trust me, I know. Sometimes it's fun to just run in and type up "BOLOGNA! I LOST MY PANTS!!!! XD XD XD", but this is generally frowned upon. Some users see this as an excuse to type up something equally stupid, and this is bad for the chat. It's very difficult to have a legitimate discussion when everyone is going nuts.

Option B may seem like it's boring at first, but once you learn about what the topic is, you can judge your interest on it. What's great about doing this is that you can now decide whether or not you wish to participate. Now, let me make this clear: The chat is not a video game. There are no prizes for how many lines you enter. You do not always have to have something to say. I'm not saying that what you've got to say is unimportant. I'm really not. But maybe before you hit the enter key you can ask yourself, "Is what I'm about to say really necessary? Will it add to the conversation at all?."

If the answer is yes, then by all means, say it! We love to hear about what you've got to talk about! If the answer is no, then try again! The lightbulb wasn't created on the first try.

If the chat seems dead, and nobody really has anything to say, it's perfectly okay to try and bring your own topic to the table. If it doesn't catch on or nobody responds in 5-10 minutes, you may want to try again. That's okay, too, but there's a simple rule to this that you can follow. If you can see the same suggestion that you recently typed on your screen, then so can everyone else. Trust me, we read almost everything, and if we see your topic and are interested, we will let you know.

Sometimes none of this really works. Everyone has their own projects, and maybe you should do something else for a bit. Read, go on youtube, play SRB2, whatever! When you come back someone may have said something of note and the conversation may have gotten rolling.

If you're not interested in a certain topic, don't bash it, in #srb2fun we talk about a little bit of everything, after all, it's a general discussion chatroom! But don't lose hope! Just wait in a while and they'll be talking about something else, you can even try to spark your own conversation too! Unless you're really interested in arguing with people, or causing a fuss, which is not very effective, and might earn you the wrath of the operators.

Another few things:

1. Try to keep /me commands to the minimum. They're not very funny, regardless of how they might seem like it. If you get a cheap laugh out of it, you're probably the only one, and I grimace whenever I see that colored text.

2. You don't have to talk about srb2 in there. We have a variety of discussions.

3. Try and listen to the ops. They're people too, so don't treat them like your new messiah, but understand that if you can't follow a simple suggestion then they'll get a headache and want to make you leave.

4. Have fun! You can make a lot of great friends in IRC, but nobody wants to be friends with a mental patient! Be smart, be respectable!

Once you get these things down, IRC will become a lot easier for everyone. I really do care about the IRC community that we have, and it pains me to see the condition that it's currently in. I'm sorry if this thread seems a bit cumbersome, or even out of place, but I feel it necessary that someone do something to resolve this issue.
Just remember: Common sense is the key.
 
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I fully endorse this message. The last few weeks, it has seemed a lot like #srb2fun is where intelligent conversation goes to die. It doesn't need to be that way, and following the guidelines described above is a great way to avoid that problem. We're always happy to have new members in the channel, but not when all they do is spout memes and generally act stupid.
 
Crazy is hilarious.

But with all due respect, I do hope that this might clear up some idiocy. Perhaps it should be linked in the channel itself? Regardless, excellent job.

EDIT: Whoops, spoke too soon. Ah hah.
 
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I didn't think it was bad enough to need a common-sense topic, but either way, common-sense is common-sense. Though, speaking for myself, its not knowing what to do as much as knowing when I've crossed the line.

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A few things I'd add is not to troll a conversation just because you don't like the subject in question, because it doesn't make them want to stop and in the end makes you look like a jerk.

Also, some general indications that you've crossed the line and your banter is now /b/ material.
1: Other users tell you to shut up
2: You've mentioned multiple jokes/memes/references that have no relation to one another or the active conversation
3: An administrator tells you to shut up
4: You've repeated the same joke/meme/reference more than twice, despite others clearly having seen it
5: Your /me commands and similar nonsense take up the whole screen
6: An administrator tells you to shut up
There's still gray areas, but in those cases its just pretty much easy to go along with what the administrators say.
 
You forgot to mention specifically not to overuse memes or use them stupidly, because some people still won't realize that.

Other than that, good job.
 
I actually haven't noticed many people being idiots (besides BP and Hyperson towards me for no bloody reason...), I guess I just missed it all.
 
Nice one, Crazy.

I'm with Spazzo on this, I'd +rep your if we had it. :x

This thread is sponsored by Cue.
 
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This thread is win. Also lessthanthree.
Nice job there, crazy, what with the stating the obvious to people who need it.
 
Finally, someone with the sense to make common sense into rules for those people who really think they're the center of the multiverse. +rep from me, if we had it. *shot* ...what?
 
This is all my fault because I never use #'fun for intelligent conversation anymore :)
 
This thread has received the "Official Seal of Mach's Approval".
Yeah sums up what a lot of people need to practice more, although I'm guilty of some of it.
 
Ok guys, we get it. You like the thread.
Instead of doing useless approving posts, why not contribute something to the guide?
Not scolding or anything, just saying, you guys could do something much more useful with your time than just repeating what others have said.
 
Incidentally, the IRC channel has been a lot more bearable as of late. I don't know if this thread had anything to do with it, really, but I'm happy.
 
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