I think this is a cute idea If a chatbox can't be implemented I think a good substitute would be a discord server, if the mods were to want to dedicate their time to one.
We currently don't have a shoutbox or similar equivalency just because I'm not sure we'd be able to successfully manage it-- the forum's still very new, and we have our hands full getting all the basics ironed out. Once the forum is in a more stable place, where we won't be scrambling as much to get everything in order and wrangle code, I would like to look into a Discord server or implement the chatbox potentially, but am currently holding off on that.
Just throwing my two cents in here; I would personaly prefer a discord server over a chat box. Discord has bots that can make moderating easier, plus it gives me push notifications!
(Regardless of what path staff takes here, I do understand it'll take time to set up due to these forms being new. Good luck guys!)
[Alister] For a Discord server- We run one already; it's not too big and could easily be rebranded as being associated with NNP if staff is interested that way you're not being spread too thin taking on multiple projects. We'd be more than willing to discuss this over DM's.
Quite a lot of people, actually! We certainly do and most of our friends do. If you play video games a lot or want a curated fandom community, its an extremely good option and it gives you easy mobile access. Many people moved to zoom, but zoom's privacy concerns and video call over chat emphasis means many communities that arent primarily small meeting video calls stayed on discord. Some people moved to telegram as well, but telegram is smaller and iirc it doesnt have as good of a community feature. While discord has its issues, its far better than skype or modern socmed places in terms of community groupings and moderation abilities, so if you are in these kinds of communities, you tend to use it. As for the gaming bit, its lightweight enough your computer doesnt have a meltdown if you are playing one and in a call unlike skype, and while zoom is pretty lightweight also, discord has less hicccups in it conflicting with the game and causing errors or just being cumbersome to get around.
While not ideal for some, I'm looking to redesign my BBS and IRC once they're smoothly running for non/alterhumans as I'm not a fan of Discord, so that could be an alternative. Plus, I'll be able to set up a verification filter on both so we won't get any trolls or bots and it can remain a safe private space for alterhumans free of judgement :^)
Discord crashes all the time tho and has a reputation for being extremely toxic with therian and otherkin communities
That might just be your experience with the crashing? Sometimes calls are a bit spotty by our internet is hot garbage and we are not going to blame discord for that. Weve only had individual server outages a few times in 5+ years and the app itself has never crashed unless our internet went out- which isnt discords fault.
As for extremely toxic, do you mean individual community servers or poor customer support- because if its the first one proboards itself gets the same treatment- when you can just Make a community, anyone can make a community and thus a server may get extremely toxic because people can be Like That. Its again, not discord's fault and comes down to communities. A certain percentage is just going to be Like That in any public community building sphere and the more popular it is the more visible that percentage will be and discord is still very very popular. Weve certainly been on more toxic forums than discord servers. Your experience is curated by the people you get invites from, and if you vet your servers carefully before joining for red flags and dont join servers that have dogwhistles/wibbly server rules like 'no freaks' and/or strong ID 'no doubles or talking to people who are doubles' culture or have mods whos listed profiles are filled with drama and being mean for clout then you will have a better time. By doing this on any site that lets you make communities(and you should) you can avoid a lot of toxicity. By following this rule we have only had to leave one server- and it wasnt a alterhuman one. The point stands that discord is a valid and comfortable choice for a chat service when alternate options are hard to code, clunky, expensive, on more obscure platforms, or have less options for modding, sorting, etc- at the very least as a stopgap until a in-house chat is made. If enough people dont like discord though slack might be viable? Weve never used slack but weve heard good things. Wed certainly like a in-house chat over a discord server ourselves for other reasons, but that is a coding endeavor that has been previously stated in this thread as possibly unfeasible.
If its the second weve never heard of therians getting poor service in comparison to others and wed love to hear about it if so?
I'd prefer Discord to a chatbox. I'm in multiple discord servers (many podcasts i follow have discords, both official and fanmade, for patrons or open to the public), I'm in a few alterhuman servers, and even have two discords that were made between me and 1-2 other people purely for RP. It's handy and (as others have said) pretty dependent on who is there and how it is moderated.
If people don't want a discord for whatever reason, I have used slack for years (both as a friend group app and for more professional or official groups) and I can vouch that it is pretty neat. Threads are an especially useful slack feature, allowing a conversation to branch off and continue without necessarily spamming everyone.
Discord is by far the most popular chat client right now, with a lot more features than a browser chat box and better features than most other current chat clients. Definitely would vote that route in the future.