RE: chat room
This has been a topic of discussion on a number of occasions. The thoughts of the administrators is a chat room will cause more trouble than the moderators can handle. It will mean that there will have to be a moderator on duty at all times. Chat rooms are notorious for people getting out of hand by talking about things that should not be discussed or starting a flame-fest.
Another thing that is considered is that RCUniverse is more than just a forum. It is an archive of information. All of the threads are maintained by category so that they can be searched and used by members in the future. The information that goes through a chat room is not categorized but several different topics might be discussed at the same time. Any useful information that is passed is lost once the session ends. There is no way that the information can be placed in a searchable archive.
The administrators have been steadfast in their stance against starting a chat room even though several members have requested that one be started. The polls that have been done in the past have shown that a majority of members are against having a chat room because of the resources that it will take from RCU, primarily in the efforts of the moderators. The problems involved in maintaining a chatroom through RCU far outweigh the benefits that might be gained.