WMACS Chatroom

From Wikimacs

With the increasing popularity of instant messaging clients, especially AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), campers have found a new way of keeping in touch. The WMACS Chatroom, an AIM chatroom, arose shortly after campers chose AIM as their favorite means of online messaging. While precursors existed in 1999 and 2000, the chatroom as we know it today truly took shape in 2001 thanks to the efforts of campers like Barry Huang and Glenda Fu, who tirelessly invited people to keep the room populated and could be found in the room at all hours of the day (and night).

The chatroom is best known for being completely intelligible, with multiple totally unrelated conversations going on at the same time and text flying by faster than comprehensible. It is not uncommon to find the chatroom populated by the maximum of 36 members (formerly 32), some more aware of what is going on than others. Despite its chaotic nature, campers are drawn to the chatroom to pass the time and stay in touch with the friends they made over the week. The chatroom is typically born when the first AIM-savvy camper returns from pick-up or the Closing Ceremony and has a life span of approximately a month; the chatroom usually slowly dies away with the start of the academic school year in late August/early September. However, the chatroom also occasionally experiences short-lived resurrections after camp functions such as the reunion or PCC dances. The chatroom is also a popular recruiting ground for players to populate games such as Starcraft and TetriNet.

In 2006, Stephen Liang and Barry Huang instituted a screenname naming convention for chatroom participants that somewhat took hold; the convention simply consisted of your first and or last name (space permitting), followed by the group number (or the word "Counselor" for the counselors). The objective of the convention was to make every AIM user easily identifiable, as the entrance of any new user was usually greeted by a chorus of "Who's (screenname)?" Followers of this convention include Bernie Wu (BernieCounselor) and Calvin Yu (CalvinFromB6).

The primary chatroom sometimes spawns side chatrooms in which a smaller group of participants gathers to talk about a more specific topic in a slightly more cohesive manner; examples include the Outside and "The Cool Chat".