However, for some background as to if you're interested in getting it going again...

When I first started the channel, years and years back, it was very rarely used, and others only popped in once in a blue moon, as you noted, and often only when I bothered them to poke their heads in.

But I kept doing it, and I kept inviting people on the board and through other means- AIM, Gchat, etc- to go into the channel, and after awhile, it started to have a regular, if small population, and then eventually grew.

That isn't to say that the chatroom didn't have it problems at its beginning, or at any other point along the way.

Basicallly, if you want to try and get others to use it, give them a reason. Invite people in! Bother them! Maybe set up, I dunno, little chat parties, for specific discussions or whatever, see what happens, what interests people to get them to pop their head in.

I'll be honest, I miss the fun of direct conversation with multiple PPCers at once in a more real-time setup as compared to the board, but the channel had loads of problems, which could maybe be changed. I dunno.

-Thoughfully, July

... or at least to remove it from active service (I'm assuming 'as a backup' would mean 'we won't use it, but if everything else crashes we'll pass the link around'), please let me know and I'll take it out of the Board header. Ta.

hS

As in, if other methods of chatting fail for some reason, we'll at least have the IRC. This is, admittedly, a pretty weak reason, so I wouldn't consider it a loss if we got rid of it. I do think we need to find something to replace it, though.

I'd put forward Skype as a suggestion, but someone already pointed out that it's a little unreliable. I'd say Steam chat, but not everyone has or wants Steam. If anyone else finds a magical chat that never breaks down or takes up HD space, feel free to speak up.

...yeah, it's pretty much dead, as far as I've seen. I would be fine with calling it a day.

I know at least on my computer that massive skype chats break stuff down really quickly and terribly.

How bout you get rid of it and create a giant skype chat?