The Pub Discussion Board

This is a notice that at the end of (my) day tonight, I will be closing the Mystic Wolf Pub chat room.  The reason for this closure is that the room has caused me a lot of stress over the last several months, and with the lack of interest in the chat room of the vast majority of the people who visit this site, I felt that the negatives of maintaining it far outweighed the positives.

While I cannot and will not detail all the things that have happened in the chat room to stress us (LAoW and myself), I can demonstrate the vast lack of interest by pointing out that, in the four scheduled chats that happened this last week, there were a total of ZERO participants.  Literally no one showed up... for any of them.  The only people who attended were the chat room ops.

Now, before anyone thinks that the closure is a knee-jerk reaction to the lack of attendance to the chats, let me clarify.  The scheduled chats were a last-ditch effort on my part to save the chat room.  I was trying to find some usefulness that could come out of it, to offset the stress I have to endure.  So, the only way the chats could have had an effect was in keeping the room open.  Since the chats just verified my belief that no one gives a damn about the chat room, I see no reason to keep it open any longer.  I'm sure you won't miss it.

I will keep the chat room registered, so that no one can hijack it and misuse the name.  Also, should any author (or artist), or group wish to schedule a chat in our room in the future, it will be made available to them for that purpose.

While I cannot speak for other authors, if you wish to chat with me, you can use any one of my IM accounts.  I have accounts on AIM, Yahoo, ICQ, GoogleTalk, MSN, and Meebo.  Feel free to say hi.  I am leaving my IM program open 24/7 (though obviously I set myself away when I'm not at my computer).

If you do not use IM regularly, but would still like to say hi for a few minutes, there is a new feature in my section of the site.  On each of my pages, you'll find, on the left-hand side, a chat window.  You don't need to log in, or identify yourself, or anything at all.  Just wait for it to connect, and then start typing your message.  While this will never be a requirement, I am strongly encouraging all of the other authors on the site to sign up for a Meebome account, as well, so that I can add this functionality for them.

I would like to say thank you to everyone who visited the chat room, especially those who made regular or semi-regular appearances.  I know that, for a very few people, the loss of the chat room will be of significance.  To those people:  I am sorry, but I can no longer justify the expense of time and my sanity to continue dealing with the crap that goes on in there.

Sincerely,
Eric Storm