Everyone surfs the web and sends e-mail, but what mystifies a lot of Internet users is chatting. Chatting is that Internet application that everyone has heard about, but people are leery of because it is not as straightforward as e-mail, and it can get you into compromising if not abusive situations, just like any other human interaction.

But, millions of Intent users everyday sit down at computers for hours at a time, typing frantically to people they don't know. So many people chat that online chatters have developed a substantial culture complete with its own jargon and manners called "chatiquette''. Why do people do chat? They aren't all sexual predators and con artists. People chat for a variety of reasons.

One of the big reasons people chat is because in chat rooms people judge you on what you say, and not what you look like, what you wear or what kind of car you drive.

So let's start from the beginning. Chatting online simply refers to people who type messages to each other on their computers. While the Internet began in the 1960s and the Web in the early 1990s, and Usenet newsgroup in 1979, chatting started in 1988 when a Finnish man named Jarkko Oikarinen wrote Internet Relay Chat, or IRC. Chat messages are distributed via IRC servers -- computers on the Internet using the IRC protocol to communicate. Like the World Wide Web, there are thousands of IRC servers on the Internet that you can log in to in order to send and receive message instantaneously. The protocol that web servers use is the familiar "http'' thing that we see in our web browser. News servers use the protocol "NNTP''. IRC was the first protocol or language that computers used to send messages instantaneously.

IRC didn't become popular until the Persian Gulf War, when people created channels for the purpose of sharing information about the conflict. Suddenly, IRC wasn't seen as something just for computer nerds. It was a way to broadcast news. Today there are many different ways to chat with many different chat protocols but IRC is the one that people generally mean when they talk about chatting online.

There are two kinds of chatting. Chatting with people you know and chatting anonymously with people you do not know.

Warning: Chatting is Not Safe for Children Chatting with strangers gives the Internet its bad reputation as a place where you can get propositioned or cheated. And this reputation is partly deserved because there are bad people online just as there are bad people anywhere. Just as you do not let your child talk to strangers when you go away, never let your child chat online with strangers. There is enough for kids to do online, reading and learning from all the educational web sites that kids do not need to chat anyway. With that warning for children not to ever chat online, let's look at the good things chat rooms offer adults.

Chatting Anonymously We have all heard about the chat rooms where lonely people go to find their true love, and end up losing their life savings to a con artist. That is why you should never give out any identifiable personal information like your last name, or street address online. But there are other kinds of chat rooms. For instance, there are a ton of support chat rooms that are devoted to helping people deal with their problems. Whether the problems are physical or psychological, chances are there's a chat room devoted to it. There are online support chat rooms for recovering alcoholics, cancer patients, and abuse victims and weight watchers and smokers trying to quit, to name a few.

Online support chat rooms serve the same purpose as real-life meetings with support groups. They give you a forum to talk about yourself and your problems and to help others who are in similar situations. For Bermudians online support chat rooms might be especially helpful because there may not be enough people on the island with your specific problem to form a traditional support group, and it is always nice to talk with people who know what you are going through.

When you chat anonymously you must choose a nickname, called a "nick'' and then either log on to an IRC server or go to a web site and then choose which chat room or IRC channel you want to chat in.

IRC software comes with a list of IRC servers that you can log in to. Just choose one from the list. Chat rooms or IRC channels are devoted to specific topics. Some good IRC channels to start with are: new2irc, newuser, newbies.

To download IRC software for free and read more about IRC, check out www.irchelp.org IRC can be a bit overwhelming because it requires IRC software and there is so much to choose from. You can chat with just your web browser if it has a Java plugin, and the most recent versions of both Netscape and Internet Explorer come with the Java plugin all ready to go. If you are looking for just a general chat room to see what it is all about, just go to a major search engine, like www.yahoo.com and click on the chat link. If you are looking for a support group online, try typing in "support chat rooms'' in your favourite search engine, and a long list will appear.

Chatting with Your Friends Maybe you do not need a support group, or you do not want to create a nickname and meet people in cyberspace. Online chatting can still help you keep in touch with your friends who are away. All you need is an instant messaging software application.

Instant messaging works like this. When you start or open your instant messaging software, it connects to a central server on the Internet that verifies your identity and registers you as being online. The instant messaging software that you choose will require you to either enter in a screen name or e-mail address, so the server can track everyone currently online. But, the instant messaging server only tells the people who know your e-mail address or your screen name that you are online, so strangers cannot send you a message.

With instant messaging software, you do not have to go into a chat room or a channel. You just have a list of people you want to talk with, and if any of those people goes online, the server tells you. You don't have to have your instant messaging software running at all times. If you need to complete work on a project or you just aren't in the frame of mind to "chat'', you do not have to start your instant messenger software.

Set up a chat group Some companies are using instant messaging to assemble virtual teams from locations all over the world. Instant messaging allows employees to reside in their virtual offices while providing a way to communicate with clients and co-workers and sometimes even provide customer service. Rather than run to your co-workers desk to ask them a question, you can send them an instant message to save time. Instant messaging is much more cost-effective than video conferencing or even the phone because the software is free and sending instant messages is like sending e-mail -- it is free too. Like everything else, you can download it from the Internet. The three most used instant messaging software programs are: AOL Instant Messenger (AIM): http://www.aol.com/aim/home.html Infoseek PeopleLink: http://www.peoplelink.com/v 1/down--infoseek ICQ (pronounced "I Seek You''): http://www.icq.com/icqme.html There is one problem with instant messaging software. Instant messaging programs use different and incompatible protocols, so they cannot inter-operate with one another. The other person that you want to contact must use the identical software that you use. For example, an ICQ user can not use his software to message someone using AOL Instant Messenger or Infoseek's Instant Messaging, also known as PeopleLink.

Which one should you use? Since they are all about the same, you should use the one that your friends use, so that you can all chat together. I prefer Infoseek's PeopleLink, because it uses e-mail addresses, and does not require you to have a log-on name, and it does not have public searchable directories of its users.

So whether you decide to try anonymous chatting where people judge you for what you say, or you decide to save money on your phone bill and use instant messaging software to communicate, cyber smileys :-) will make your day.

Michelle Swartz's column appears on the first and third Wednesday of every month in The Royal Gazette's Personal Technology section. She can be reached at michelle ychristers.net