News

Bid a fond adieu to our two mods, Khuriya and Away. They have elected to join the Aluriya mod team (though you won't have to bid them much of an adieu since they will still remain as regular players on Khimeros).

6 Comments

I felt the need to post more news about this issue because I think it's gotten WAY out of hand, and our original intentions were being completely lost in a lot of mis-communication and misunderstanding.

I want you to understand what precipitated the new rules, from my perspective, and what our intentions were as opposed to how those intentions were interpreted. I'm not not going to say, "OMG this is all the users' fault" and I'm asking you to not jump to the conclusion of "OMG this is all Onyx's fault" either.

Those of you who have not been in the chat a lot lately, or perhaps at the wrong (right?) times, may not have noticed the increase in really severe problems with really excessive chatspeak and nearly incoherent posts in the live chat room. But it HAS been a problem, and one that several users have complained to me about. It got so bad, that something had to be done. Letting things go on as they were was not an option unless I wanted to let a lot of regular users be driven out of the chat.

THIS is the kind of behavior that the rules were aimed at. Not at those who have difficulty with spelling for whatever reason, not those who use chatspeak occasionally.

When I came up with "The Playground", the connotation it had for me was a place where you can have fun, chat how you want, without worrying about someone looking over your shoulder to tell you how to type. I think how many of you guys took it was as "OMG you're not mature enough for the main chat, go to the playground with the little kids, lulz". Again, I'm not placing blame on you for taking it the wrong way - I'm just pointing out that this was NOT the intention.

Asking those who break the rules in the Lounge to go to the Playgorund was, for me, no different than if say, we had a sales chat, and users were selling things in the main chat. In that case, you'd be removed to the sales chat. It was not meant to be offensive to anyone.

Spelling rules - We're only asking that YOU make an attempt, to the best of your ability, to spell the best you can. We are not comparing you to some gold standard for spelling and judging you against it. We know that there are numerous people on the site who have difficulties with spelling. We're not trying to hit on you or make you feel uncomfortable. We're only asking that everyone make a small effort. The staff are not going to ban you because you spell something wrong, or even a lot of things wrong. But if everyone makes a little effort in that regard, it helps a lot.

All we're asking, is that you keep things REASONABLE in the chat. We aren't banning chatspeak. We aren't banning people for spelling errors. We're just asking you to make an effort to understand that in order to make things legible for everyone, we HAVE to have some rules.

I have also asked Nasire to automatically capitalize I's and words like I've, I'm, etc. in the chat, so you won't have to worry about that, it will be done automatically. I'm hoping this will satisfy both those who can't stand missing capitalization and those who couldn't care less about it and have difficulty remembering it.

I'm also asking, that everyone try to keep discussions in the news comments a little more civil. There were some pretty horrid things being said on BOTH sides of this debate, as well as in previous debates. I don't like to censor the news comments, but I'm asking everyone to try to present your opinions in a bit more courteous manner in the future.

In closing, I'd just like to say that I'm sorry if anyone felt hurt or unwanted by the implementation of these rules. That was certainly not our intent, they were put in place to make the site a BETTER place for everyone. However, we DO have to have some rules, and just like all the other site rules, they do need to be followed.



23 Comments

Unfortunately we have had to remove the Playground. It was our intention to make the greatest number of users happy by providing two chat rooms, one where chatspeak etc, was kept to a minimum and another one where you could write any way you wanted.

However, it's become clear that no matter what we changed the name of "The Playground" to, or no matter how we implement it, some people are going to feel offended. And to be frank, we just don't feel it's worth the ongoing drama that would be involved in keeping it open :c Sorry to everyone who was enjoying the Playground.

I am aware that there are numerous people claiming that they cannot, for one reason or another, abide by the rules in the Lounge. While I am sure that some of these reasons are legitimate, I have to remind you once again that I have to keep the well-being of the entire site in mind, not just the needs of a few people who cannot, for one reason or another, capitalize their I's or try to keep the chatspeak to a minimum.

You WILL be expected to abide by the rules in the Lounge. If you cannot or will not do so, then the site DOES have the capability for users to create their own chatrooms, and I'd advise using that option.

I ask that BEFORE YOU START COMMENTING about not being able to spell properly and that it's not fair that we're going to ban you because of it, etc, etc., that you READ the rules of the Lounge so that you know whether there is even any need to be worried or not.

There is NOTHING in the rules stating that we will ban you for misspelling a word. We ask that you TRY as much as possible, to use correct spelling most of the time, as a courtesy to other users.

We are also not banning all chatspeak, all smilies, forcing you to use correct grammar at all times, or any of the other extreme situations that I've been hearing about. These are the rules:

"Please keep use of chatspeak to a mimimum in the Lounge. Khimeros is a site intended for older teens and adults, and we wish the live chat to reflect this. You may use short forms such as brb, lol, etc. but do not use one-letter/number short forms (for example 'r u there?'). You may use "smilies" in moderation. You must use correct capitalization of the letter 'I'; 'I want to chat', not 'i want 2 chat'. Please make an attempt to use correct spelling where possible (you will not be banned for making a spelling error, but it's common courtesty to other users to do the best you can). You MUST abide by these rules, and all other rules, in the Lounge or you will be asked to leave."

These are hardly horrible, onerous rules; they are exactly the same kind of rules found in live chats all over the internet. If you wish to use the public chat room on Khimeros, then you MUST abide by these rules, or you will be removed.

Thank you for your co-operation.





45 Comments

There have been some changes made to the live chat rooms.

We have discontinued the help chat and the CSS and Art chats, because they simply were not seeing enough use, and users were getting snarky about there not being staff in the help chat to serve them instantly, even though there was a notice asking them to grab a mod from the main chat if they had a question.

You can ask for help, or talk about art and css, in the main chats now. You may NOT sell or give away art or css in the main chats, sorry :(

You will notice that instead of one main chat room, there are now two. "The Lounge" and "The Playground".

The Lounge is for "literate" chatting (for want of a better term). This means that the "no chatspeak, use proper capitalization" rule applies there.

The Playground is a casual chatroom, and chatspeak/captitalization/spelling rules do not apply there.

This way, there is a level of chatting that should be comfortable for everyone.

Now that the Playground is active, chatspeak rules WILL be enforced in the Lounge. If you are asked to move to the Playground, please do so for at least 24 hours. Being asked to move to the Playground is not a punishment, it reflects the level of "literacy" (again, for want of a better term) that the mods feel you are capable of using in the chats. Both chatrooms are equally legitimate.

46 Comments

If you're having some trouble getting fully into the spirit of retro month, you might want to have Thimble craft you some nice bell bottoms and tie dyed T-shirts.



9 Comments