In the Transhumanist Party on Facebook there is a discussion about which chat technologies to use. Chat rooms may be quite interesting and useful.
For a general impression about the different core technology choices there’s this comparison between IRC, XMPP (Jabber), and a new technology called PSYC:
http://about.psyc.eu/Comparison
However, XMPP seems to be reasonably flexible and missing features could be added on top of the core functionality. Here are two XMPP servers that were mentioned:
For the client side there is a large list of software:
http://xmpp.org/xmpp-software/clients/
Ideally, we would also use browser based client options like:
- Converse.js (there’s already WordPress integration)
- Jappix (this looks more like a full social media suite)
Nevertheless, there may be something to be said about the simplicity of IRC. What I don’t like about IRC however is the idling culture: Most people in an IRC Channel are just there, but don’t pay any attention to what’s happening there. And there’s usually no way to tell whether a user is “not-afk” other than by asking directly or seeing him write something.
Edit: I’ve come into contact with a rather interesting looking Web-IRC system called Kiwi IRC. Just in case that we decide to use IRC after all, some day.
The PSYC technology looks promising in principle, but I haven’t looked deeper into it, yet.
What would you prefer?
Edit (2015-08-08): There seems to be a chat plugin for Discourse that’s work in progress. It’s called Babble. I think it’s better to wait and see how it develops, since we are already using an external chat tool for this forum.