In 2014, Brown and Woolley released a web-based version of Talkomatic. Talkomatic was very popular among PLATO users into the mid-1980s. It offered several channels, each of which could accommodate up to five people, with messages appearing on all users' screens character-by-character as they were typed. Woolley in 1973 on the PLATO System at the University of Illinois. The first online chat system was called Talkomatic, created by Doug Brown and David R.

Web conferencing is a more specific online service, that is often sold as a service, hosted on a web server controlled by the vendor. Online chat includes web-based applications that allow communication вЂ“ often directly addressed, but anonymous between users in a multi-user environment. The expression online chat comes from the word chat which means 'informal conversation'. Online chat in a less stringent definition may be primarily any direct text-based or video-based ( webcams), one-on-one chat or one-to-many group chat (formally also known as synchronous conferencing), using tools such as instant messengers, Internet Relay Chat (IRC), talkers and possibly MUDs or other online games.

Online chat may address point-to-point communications as well as multicast communications from one sender to many receivers and voice and video chat, or may be a feature of a web conferencing service. Thereby, a feeling similar to a spoken conversation is created, which distinguishes chatting from other text-based online communication forms such as Internet forums and email. Chat messages are generally short in order to enable other participants to respond quickly. Online chat may refer to any kind of communication over the Internet that offers a real-time transmission of text messages from sender to receiver.

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