By appearing to take the "moral high ground" and closing its chat rooms in the UK, MSN is acting irresponsibly and endangering children rather than helping them, according to Lycos.
Alex Kovach, managing director of Lycos UK -- which runs a fully moderated chatroom for around 100,000 users -- said on Wednesday that chat is here to stay, and it is not going to go away just because Microsoft has decided to close its chat facilities.
"By switching them off, Microsoft looks like it is taking the moral high ground but in reality this is irresponsible. Now it's more important that people provide responsible chat, otherwise it will get driven underground and the risks will increase," said Kovach, who explained that Lycos employs around 100 moderators across the UK and uses a combination of human intervention and software to create "a safer environment".
However, Microsoft dismisses the concept of moderated chatrooms because it says they are not 100 percent effective. The company, which has one million regular chatters, has also denied that it is pulling the plug on its chat services because of financial reasons.
Matt Whittingham, head of customer satisfaction at MSN, told ZDNet UK: "Financial considerations did not come into place here -- we made a decision solely wishing to protect our customers from inappropriate communications."
Whittingham said that the real experts in protecting children are not MSN, Freeserve or AOL, but organisations like the National Children's Home (NCH) and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC). "You cannot moderate all the chats -- it is not practical," he said.
But Kovach believes that Microsoft could make the chatrooms safer by spending money: "It is expensive to provide moderated chat -- obviously you need to provide people, but you also need quality software. It is expensive to do that," he said.
Whittingham also said that MSN had had enough of "inappropriate communications" such as pornographic spam and advised its users to "go and use safe online communications like instant messenger, which is vastly more sophisticated and safer than chat services."
Rival service provider Freeserve said in a statement: "We are somewhat bemused that MSN has managed to pull off something of a PR coup with this announcement, whilst giving the impression of being respectable and responsible: our own view is that what they are doing is nothing short of reckless."
Talkback
I agree with Microsoft for once. Chatrooms are a nothing more than a waste of internet bandwidth. I've been using the internet for years and have never needed to use them.
IM A REGULAR USER OF CHATROOMS AND AM FULLY AWARE OF THE RISKS BUT I SERIOUSLY SEE LITTLE POINT IN THERE CLOSURE AS THIS WILL ENCOURAGE PEADOFILES TO LOOK IN LESSER CONTROLLED CHAT ROOMS, I BELIEVE THE ANSWER IS IN BETTER MONITORING AND SECURITY NOT IN SHUTTING DOWN.
If you've never used a chat room how can you say that they are worthless?? I have used a room on msn for more then a year,it is a music room,where the chat is about music ,bands etc,not sex and pick ups!If your going to make a comment then at least let it be an informed one.
Surely safety online starts at home.With parents making sure they are fully aware of what their children are doing while online and making sure that they know how to stay safe,not giving out personal details etc.Don't blame chatrooms for a lack of adult supervision.Shutting down MSn will not stop kids using a chatting service ,they will just move to another provider.There are many sites out there with chat rooms attached,that are completly unmonitored.One of the *buffy* sites for example has a chat room on it.Parents must stay aware of what is going on in their own homes,before looking to shift the blame onto a service provider.
I have used MSN's chatrooms for about 5 years. I quickly found user created chatrooms as a place to have some wonderful conversations with people from all over the world.
If MSN worried about "children" seeing things they shouldn't see, then why not just get rid of the pornbots that would come into the rooms? (All a person had to do is turn their whispers off and they wouldn't receive any unwanted communications.)
One day I stumbled into the Computing Catagory of MSN chat. I was amazed at how many people were willing to share their knowledge on PC repair and troubleshooting. Sitting in the PC Help Center repair rooms taught me an incredible amount about how to keep my computer running smoothly.
I can understand MSN's decision to go to pay service for chat, they are a business, but stopping all chat from Europe makes me feel like Europe is being punished like a child for being bad. Europe is being sent into time-out.
I wish i had MSN as an ISP so i could cancel them!
Three cheers for msn taking the action to close their chatrooms.Generally speaking, they are a load of claptrap.Given the amount of chatrooms,it all evolves around one subject sex!
Unfortunately, a good internet communication was given a bad name and, msn did not want any part of it.Who could blame them?
Hopefully, this is not the end of the so called chatrooms, and they can make a come back, but this time better managed so keep these perverts can be made accountable for their actions.The beauty of the internet allows people to communicate.Not just adults, but children too!
The point where it goes off the rails, is when people, especially children when they get harmed or, corrupted by the content of chatrooms and, those perverted souls in life.