| What
is a Chat Room? |
 |
A
Chat room is an online meeting place. Users sign on using an anonymous
sign-on name. The upside is that users do not have to reveal their
details immediately, the downside is that anyone can pretend to be
anyone - enabling a 55 year old man to pose as a 14 year old boy |
| How
do people talk? |
 |
By
typing messages, either in public - where their words are displayed on
screen for all to see - or through a private ("pm") or instant
("im") message that is one-to-one. Users may choose to
activate voice messaging and talk in real time through a microphone, or
even use a video link where image froma personal webcam is seen on
screen. |
| What
are the themes? |
 |
Everything
conceivable. Yahoo!, one of the major chat room providers, host rooms
based on country, region, sexual orientation, profession etc where like
minded people gather to talk. There are also "user rooms",
which can be created by anyone, carrying titles on any subject -
examples include "Young Girls for Older Men", "The Incest
Room", "Teens for Married Men", "The Upskirt Room"
- there are hundreds of variants. |
| Is
there any age restriction? |
 |
Few
chat rooms use any form of age verification. Yahoo! will not allow
access to 'adult rooms' for any person who is registered as under 18, a
system easily beaten by the average teenager as it is dependent upon the
user's registration details for verification. A 13 year old only has to
state that he/she is 18 when registering to be deemed so. |
| Are
the rooms monitored? |
 |
To
a degree. Chat room "monitors" are voluntary. Public awareness
is growing, as seen in our News
item for the BBC 6 O'Clock
news |