TinyChat is a really cool new service that lets you create simple chatrooms on the fly within your browser.
Why is this useful? Well, say you want to get a bunch of people together for a chat, but you don’t know what technology they all have available. Some are on Skype, some not; some are IRC fans, others not; some have access to internet instant messaging, but not all.
Tony chat uses a really simple web interface to allow you to create your chatroom with a couple of clicks. You can then send the URL to the people you want involved, and you’re away.
Afterwards, your room and its contents disappear, so it really is disposable! It might be an idea for someone to copy and paste the contents of the chat before closing it down in case you want a record.
Another cool feature is to assign your Twitter account to your idenitity within your chat and which pings your followers with a link to the chatroom you have just created.
I like the idea of having impromptu online discussions using this, inviting people in via Twitter, to discuss an issue in a more ‘live’ environment that Twitter normally allows.
What other applications can you think of for TinyChat?
As far as I can tell, like so many of these cool instaweb toys, it requires particular browsers with particular settings and doesn’t speak anything standard like XMPP or IRC, so if you’re not using one of their blessed platforms, you’re still locked out!
So, I think it’s yet another incompatible chat system to add to the mess. Why do you like it?
Didn’t Meebo cover this way back?