This is a social
networking software, that is available at different levels. The most basic is
free and limited in what it can do. It can be attached to a website and can be
used like instant messaging. The software code can be generated and embedded
into the web page that it can be used from. There is no way of changing the
individual font and colour of the text. There is a filter for bad language but
no emoticons. In the free version there is also no facility of recording discussions
which means they will not be available for future revisiting as possible within
WebCT.
The professional and enterprise versions of this tool are
not free but have the additional freedom to customise the chat area by allowing
for change of font and colour of text, adding audio and visual emoticons,
forming groups, keeping logs and so on. This software can be considered if the
education institution is developing its own virtual learning environment.
Facilitator will be expected to set the focus of the discussion at the onset
just like in WebCT. The notes of the discussion will be kept in the professional
and enterprise version but unless there is another area dedicated to this in
the virtual environment it cannot be disseminated easily. The linearity of the
text messaging will yet again cause sequential incoherence (Herring 1999).
Addonchat window from the demo on their website
(http://www.addonchat.com/demo.html)
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