When were you first introduced to internet chatrooms?

[Azariah]

2003 for me. on yahoo chat. eventually i transitioned to some forums and ended up here. i was just a teenager then. i can still remember some users i used to chat with. time sure does fly by!

 

[Wintermute]

Probably round about 1998 via mIRC back in the "old days" of dial-up modems. Yeah, I'm feeling old now, thanks.

 

[Azariah]

i had to use dial-up too!

 

[user 139760]

Around 1998, maybe even earlier, for me as well. I finished high school in 1996 and around 97, I remember going to the old website the-park.com, which was I do believe on of the first, if not the first, web-based chat site in the world. It was a huge community, thousands of users around the world. It shut down sadly, but I still miss it. A significant event in my life happened because of that site.

 

[ManitobaBrit70]

My first experience of Chatrooms were the old CB radio!
But in 1995 I got my first computer then the whole world changed! I do believe i was on the Park.com too.
I remember how shocked i was that we could email......But how long it took with the stupid dial up!

 

[MisterLonely]

ALL chat about a year and a few months ago, I never had confidence to say anything in a chat room before.... That was to real at the time, I did play WoW for 6 years though, that involved some chatting...

 

[Kakuzo]

I only really joined and posted in 2016, but late 2017 and early 2018 have been when I've stepped up my posting and the number of sites I've joined.

 

[Pathfinder]

I still haven't participated in a chat room. I joined one but lasted about 30 seconds. It's not for me, and I'm okay with that.

 

[user 130057]

It depends what you're counting as a chat room. I used to use USENET almost 30 years ago... which was as near as you could get to a chatroom in pre-WWW days. I used IRC, iCQ and other things to chat and exchange messages from the early/mid 90's. Ah, the good old days...

 

[EveWasFramed]

About 1999, Yahoo chat rooms. I frequented the 80’s music chat rooms.

 

[9006]

About 99/00. Some web chat a friend introduced me to. I only vaguely remember it, but I've never been into chat that much. MSN/WLM was what I grew up with and now that's gone I don't use chat at all.

 

[Azariah]

About 1999, Yahoo chat rooms. I frequented the 80’s music chat rooms.

me too. i used yahoo messenger. i forgot what chat rooms i used to go to.

 

[Joturbo]

Really old school pool game where you just signed in as a guest about 10 years ago .Was my game in the pubs so was great to play and interact with peeps from all over the world.If both players kept replaying you could play for hours with a complete stranger it was great.One night really connected with a lady in USA(I think but who knows) so much that the game just went to pot really chatting away for nearly an hour...but then I got cold feet and logged off really sad...game gone now no moderator I suppose.Then hobby forum couple years ago but bit uppercrust/cliques didn't fit in 

 

[PurpleStar]

About 2000.
We didn't have a computer at home, but a school friend of mine did and used to go on chat rooms a lot. Mostly I would sit watching her have half a dozen conversations at once in Yahoo chat, but on one occasion I did join in with one of the conversation and spent all evening talking to the person.

 

[TheLoadedDog]

Depends what you mean by chatroom. I guess 1997 or so for me. Forums like this one? Around 2000. I can remember being on a US forum when September 11 was happening live. That was something I'll never forget. Here's a link to the thread. I haven't looked at it for years, so just a warning to anybody who was affected by this event - I've no guarantees that it won't be tough reading:
https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=86458

Re the CB comment above, try public toilet wall graffiti (this was pre-tagging days. I was a kid. Around 1980 or so). Now sure, most of it was the usual disgusting "for a good time call..." sort of thing, but occasionlly, you'd see discussions. Yes, an actual thread would develop. People were being genuinely helpful quite often.

 

[Serenia]

In 1999. I was visiting my brother and while he had to work which was at work he said go on the internet if I wanted on his computer and I came across Altavista and went in their chat rooms.