Internet Relay Chat

Internet Relay Chat (or IRC) is one of the oldest protocols for online chatting and file sharing.

Some collaborative projects use it to facilitate communication between project members. Wikipedia and Conservapedia both use freenode (chat.us.freenode.net) as their IRC server.

The philosophy of IRC and of collaborative projects in general seems to mesh:

• “Catalysts try to resolve problems, not through the use of authority and special privilege, but by fostering consensus, gently nudging participants in the direction of more appropriate behavior and by generally reducing the level of confrontation rather than confronting users with problems…[while] Channel and network administrators may be catalysts…[a]n important characteristic of successful catalysts is the infrequency with which they wear authority or invoke special privilege.” (February 23rd, 2007 by Donna "SportChick" Crawford)

See http://freenode.net/catalysts.shtml

Etiquette

• Never ask before pming a staffer - you'll run out of allowed questions too quickly.

The graphical user interface of MIRC, the most popular Internet Relay Chat client.

Some IRC channels

• #conservapedia
• #conservapedia-sysop (password required)

IRC Commands

Most clients still use the old slash commands of irc. Here are a few.

1. To get onto freenode.net
   • /server irc.freenode.net
2. To join the channel
   • /join #conservapedia
3. To change your nickname
   • /nick newnick
4. To op someone This will only work if you are op(erator of the channel) at the time
   • /cs op #conservapedia nick
5. to deop
   • /dop #conservapedia nick
6. To set the topic
   • /topic new topic here