Chat room improvements?

Folks,

We are looking to improve the usage of our chat room. The first aspect we're addressing is the Java conflict that seemed to affect many IB users. Upgrading the chat software should address that problem by using the same Sun Java version that IB's TWS requires.

Beyond the technical issue, this poll is designed to give us an idea of what might make the chat room(s) more appealing to you. Arrgh, just realized you can't vote for more than one option. Please pick your top chose, and elaborate here.

André

 

I don't understand the question? can't we have it all??

 

Of course. The room will always be up. But we are looking at doing more scheduled programming and guest events. I'm working with one guest now who's only active during the open and close, so he perfers doing a chat around noon, NY time. But would that piss off our regulars.

That's where this poll is leading.

Andre

 

I voted for "chat during market hours"

But would also like to see separate rooms
for swing, day trading, futures/indexes, etc,

as well as allowing guests in for live commentary
during market hours.


peace

axeman

 

As a regular in the chat I think it may be better for a guest speaker to set himself up in a separate room if he is going to chat during market hours. He could announce that the chat is about to occur and give the password to the separate room. That way, if anyone is interested they can pop over to his/her room

 

Just bumping this up to the top menu to get some feedback at a different time of the day. Please chime in with your thoughts or suggestions, thanks to those who already have.

André

 

Ditto

 

andre,

good suggestions. i am not sure what the "critical mass" as far as numbers is to make a chat room work ,so, having seperate rooms may or may not be effective. only way to find out is to test the different concepts and see what the users prefer.

best,

surfer

 

Right now, it seems like we average about 20-22 folks in chat during trading hours. When there's an event like the Townsend Analytics chats, I've seen 50+ people in there.

One question now is, if we were to create perpetual rooms for certain types of traders, what would the current group of regulars want to be called? Seems like you guys are trading indices, mostly. Is that correct?

As for critical mass, there's many ways to look at it. The regulars now have a nice repartee. 20 is a nice number for getting to know ach other. Yet, 20 folks isn't much for a guest or vendor to go out of their way for.

So we'd like to get the overall numbers up, giving vendors and guests more incentive to come join us because we can point to our numbers. And, of course ::coughs:: to increase revenue.

Please keep the comments coming in... what could we do that would make you more likely to join in, in the chat room? What types of perpetual rooms would you like to see? If we did more special events, would you come out an attend them?

André

 

i would not enjoy just an index room, future room or stock room. i do enjoy the diversity of the current room where i can get stock tips, index direction, and moving futures all at once. i think the key here is not to be BORING. having more insightful planned chats would obviously attract more participants--- for example--if you are not a real tick user, you have no interest in listening to them. having someone like van tharp, tony oz, ollie v, etc etc etc would definitely draw a crowd and their incentive would be marketing/ PR of course.

best,

surfer