Live Election Day Chat

You're invited to hang out and chat today about the US election happenings and results.

Here's how:

* The chatroom is on the IRC network EFnet. The channel is #dailykos. (This is not an officially sanctioned Daily Kos room. It was set up during the 2004 election season by my young, well-travelled friend kolors who was trying to teach me some Japanese at the time - not that I remember any now - where we and some 200 people had quite the time chatting through the debates and election day 2004.)
* New to IRC? You can either download a free IRC chat program like mIRC or X-Chat for Windows or Snak for Macs. (There are others, including a Firefox extension called Chatzilla that works on Windows and Macs.
* If that sounds too complicated, you can try logging into the chatroom via your browser here. Enter your nickname (up to 9 characters) and the room name #dailykos. (Nicknames on Efnet can't be registered, so if someone else has yours just add a number or asterisk to it.)

Some tips:

* If you've never visited IRC before, please read this etiquette guide. You can also find a simple guide to the commands and an overview of IRC here.
* People with an @ in front of their names are "Ops" and have the right to kick or ban people at their discretion, so make sure you follow the rules.
* If a lot of people are chatting, the room can scroll by faster than a speeding bullet. Just take some time to get used to the pace.
* Don't freak out if you get disconnected. That's a common occurence on IRC.

I'll be in and out of the chatroom throughout the day. If you see 'catnipbrb', that means I'm not there. (brb=be right back)

You'll see other names in the room, but don't assume that those people are necessarily there all of the time. Some just park their names and pop in whenever. Try saying hi but don't get upset if no one answers right away.

As always, don't give out personal info, stay safe and have fun.

If you need help, type /help for a list of commands that will pop up on your screen; ask for help there or here in the comments or e-mail me. The IRC learning curve is not as high as you may think and once you know the basics (ie. like just getting yourself into the actual room), things are fairly simple.

See you there! Go Dems!