blog 30: future of chat, community norms

content/blog/30-the-future-of-chat-2/index.md

@@ -0,0 +1,124 @@
+---
+date: 2026-04-19
+title: the future of chat, part 2
+subtitle:
+preview_image:
+tags:
+- chat
+- board
+- web
+permalink: /blog/30/
+---
+
+i have [recently written](/blog/29/) about my vision for the future of chat. i got some [great feedback on fediverse](https://critters.gay/notes/al87eiu2fov900it) so guess what, im writing a followup post.
+
+---
+
+## the empty room illusion
+
+this recently happened to me on irc:
+
+> 15:45 *** arsenicCatnip has joined the channel
+> 15:46 <arsenicCatnip> is this place actually active or no
+> 15:47 *** arsenicCatnip has quit
+> 15:55 <nycki> yes, it's active--
+> 15:56 <nycki> why would you ask that and wait less than ten minutes
+
+this seems to be a fairly common occurrence in any public channel. user joins, sees a blank screen, says "where is everyone?" and then leaves within a few minutes.
+
+witch_t *navi [writes](https://critters.gay/notes/al88tkzps9xx16by):
+
+> for a new-to-irc user, nothing is more demotivating than trying it out only to join into an empty room
+
+and this is a good point! my previous proposal said "history belongs to those who are present", which would imply that when you join a room there is no history. from your perspective, the room is "empty".
+
+i used the analogy previously that when you enter a room, it's not reasonable to ask for a tape of the full conversation. however, in the real world, most rooms are not soundproof. it's reasonable to overhear a bit of the conversation _as you enter_. and it's also reasonable to enter a room and ask "what am i walking in on?" and have people answer you. so, theoretically, there's no reason you couldn't enter a chatroom and have the _last ten messages_ be visible.
+
+this is a bit of a privacy tradeoff. it means that anything you say in an open room _could_ be leaked to a stranger who enters a minute later. you're "answering in advance" the question "what's going on in here?" without anyone having to explicitly ask for it. personally i think a better solution would be to have some sort of activity indicator like '5 users were active in the last day, with the last message being 12 minutes ago'. give the metadata without leaking any specific message. but if your room is public and you really don't care who listens in, then the 'scrollback for strangers' approach is reasonable. irc v3 supports the 'see recent messages' type of scrollback, and if you wanted to do a 'recent activity indicator' you could have a script that periodically updates the topic message.
+
+that being said, i personally think these are both 'technical solutions to a social problem.' the problem isn't that the room appears empty, the problem is that _users are afraid of empty rooms._ my ideal solution is that we should re-educate users. back when i was on IRC all the time, a common aphorism given to new users was "don't ask to ask, just ask". so for instance, instead of joining a room and saying "hello? is anybody there?" you should join a room and say "hello, can anyone help me install android on my nintendo switch?". by asking a more specific question, you're more likely to get a useful answer. people are more enthusiastic when they get to be _helpful_ instead of just phatically confirming that you exist. but there's no reason we can't do both. educate users how to ask better questions, _and_ dispel the "empty room illusion" so that they don't give up so quickly.
+
+---
+
+## community norms
+
+the robots known as Kasanwa-Solane [write](https://critters.gay/notes/al9mb3kos9xx1zoc):
+
+> I really like this post :3
+> If I were to try setting up separate chat and boards for the Garden in alignment with the concepts, what might you advise on that (with regards to ready-to-deploy software, community norms, and other aspects)
+
+i'll circle back to my ideas on software in a later post. for now, let's say we're using some flavor of irc that supports ephemeral chats, but with configurable scrollback to avoid the empty room illusion, possibly [ERGO](https://ergo.chat/). for anything worth making persistent, we'll also use some flavor of wiki that supports private pages, possibly [pmwiki](https://www.pmwiki.org/).
+
+i like this comment about 'community norms' because, yeah, i'm basically advocating for a constructed culture around ephemeral chat! any constructed culture like this is going to need some sort of charter. this is by no means 'final' or even 'well-researched'. think of this as a scientific hypothesis i'd like to test: 'a healthy community based around ephemeral chat could work like this.'
+
+---
+
+### consent comes first
+
+the first law of robotics says that a robot must not harm a human, nor passively allow a human to be harmed. this law supercedes all other laws.
+
+this is good advice for non-robots too.
+
+---
+
+### kick early, kick often, forgive generously
+
+i think part of what accelerates 'chat rot' is our collective tendency to avoid making waves, to keep people around even when we're not really comfortable with them. if i'm constructing a culture intentionally, then i think a good first rule is that all moderators should make frequent use of the kick button. kick people who are idle! kick people who keep talking after being asked to drop a subject! and kick people for making awful jokes (but re-invite them afterwards because awful jokes are great actually).
+
+hand-in-hand with this is the need for an appeals system. getting kicked is scary right now because there's no way to be un-kicked. my experience on discord and telegram is that the moderators of most groups will block you after kicking you, which means you can never say 'sorry' or learn from your mistakes. obviously appeals are a privilege, not a right, but it's a privilege we should extend more generously, both to encourage people to learn, and to make moderators feel a little less 'heavy' about using that kick button.
+
+maybe if we all get used to kicking and re-adding each other, we won't have to resort to chat mitosis so often.
+
+---
+
+### ban to protect, not to punish
+
+sometimes a kick is not enough, and you must permanently remove someone from a room. always remember that a ban is not a punishment, because the purpose of a punishment is to teach a lesson. people don't learn lessons from bans, not that i've ever seen in my life.
+
+because a ban is not a punishment, it doesn't have to be "earned" by breaking some specific rule. there is no objective criteria for a ban. a moderator should use bans to protect a vulnerable user, or to protect their own ability to be a moderator.
+
+put another way: moderators have limited time and energy to manage a chat. don't make yourself difficult to manage.
+
+---
+
+### encourage curiosity
+
+for everything that "everyone knows", there are about 10,000 people hearing it for the first time today ([xkcd 1053](https://xkcd.com/1053/)). everyone's a beginner at some point. and if you insult beginners by saying things like "just google it", you miss out on the fun.
+
+my least favorite thing about old chat communities was the principle of "lurk moar", the implication that easy questions are a waste of time and you should just wait around to see what happens. that's so boring!! i think we should encourage people to ask easy questions, because they're fun to answer. if you get the same question repeatedly, write your answer on the wiki and link to it there, but _actually write it!_ don't make people learn "unwritten stuff" all the time. besides, linking to wiki pages is fun! we should be having fun here!
+
+---
+
+### be bold
+
+something i learned from tvtropes before its [unfortunate descent](https://www.reddit.com/r/tvtropes/comments/177iezl/they_changed_tv_tropes_now_it_sucks/) into self-censorship was this: if your wiki supports rollbacks, then you should edit it recklessly. after all, if you make a mistake, someone more pedantic will come along and fix it. correcting people is like, the internet's favorite pasttime. embrace this! **be bold!**
+
+at pretty much every job i've worked, i've noticed a sort of "if it works, don't touch it" effect. this leads to people making pages inside pages, folders inside folders, squirreling away their words into deeper and deeper holes to avoid "messing with anything." if you see this happening, please "hoist" the squirreled page back up to the top level. merge threads, re-organize paragraphs, and [link egregiously](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Pothole).
+
+---
+
+### there are no thought crimes
+
+if you agree with all the rules stated so far, then i hope i can convince you that this is a necessary conclusion: *there is no such thing as an illegal idea.* yes, this *is* about kinks and fetishes. someone will be interested in a thing that you find gross or even reprehensible, and i am asking you to *live with that.*
+
+because we encourage curiosity, there is no shame in asking questions about a niche kink. today is the first day someone has heard about, say, cuckholdry. we should give them the opportunity to ask questions in good faith.
+
+because we are bold, we should avoid prematurely making sub-rooms for these topics. more rooms means more strain on moderators. we can discuss things openly like mature adults.
+
+---
+
+### ...but no freedom from consequences, either
+
+because we ban to protect, not to punish, moderators are allowed to say "no, you can't discuss that here, and no, we won't make a separate room for it." it's okay to ban a topic just for causing distress.
+
+caveat to the above: politics and drama are just subjects that people disagree about ([xkcd 1124](https://xkcd.com/1124/)). if you ban something for causing a disagreement, you are taking a side. yes, you are. you can't ban a topic without taking sides on it. if you claim to be 'neutral' then you are defending whichever side is the current status quo (innuendo studios, [how to radicalize a normie](https://innuendostudios.tumblr.com/post/188501365677/heres-how-to-radicalize-a-normie-a-video-essay)).
+
+it's okay to take sides, but please do so *on purpose* and not carelessly. ban topics in order to prevent a nazi bar, not to create one. instead of saying "no politics" for instance, consider taking an explicit political stance, like "we stand against racism."
+
+(side note: in every case where ive observed someone say they "can't stand zoomer slang", what they actually mean is "i think poor and non-white people should be forced to talk like me." usually they haven't made this connection until i bring it up, but they don't deny it once i do.)
+
+and finally, because consent comes first, if someone pushes forward with a topic that causes distress to someone else, *kick the offender immediately and ask questions later.* don't wait for three strikes. break it up *now*. if it was an accident, make it a learning opportunity. and if someone makes themselves difficult to manage, then don't invite them back.
+
+---
+
+if i have made any mistakes here then kindly inform me before starting wars on my behalf. happy to be corrected. thanks.