Open chat and anonymous aliases

An open chat is a room you can enter without being friends with anyone in it. You can browse the open chat list in the messenger and join right away, and anyone can create a room by giving it a title. Whoever creates the room becomes its owner.

• The list is searchable by room title and shows how many people are in each room
• Once you join you can also read what was said before you arrived — open chats do not hide earlier history
• If you leave and come back, everything said in between is still there to read

Anything you post in an open chat is readable by people who join later. Do not share personal details the way you might in a 1:1 or group conversation.

There are two kinds of open chat. A room with no password appears in the open chat list and anyone can join from there. If you set a password when creating the room, it is left out of the list and only people with the invite link can reach it.

• The invite link is copied from the menu inside the room
• A password room needs both the link and the correct password
• The password is set when the room is created and cannot be changed or removed later
• Opening a link never joins you on its own. A confirmation dialog shows the room title and member count first, and you have to confirm

Whoever receives your link can pass it on. A password does not make the room limited to the people you personally invited.

In an open chat you appear under an alias made of a color name and an animal name instead of your nickname. The alias is derived from the room and the person together, so the same person gets a different alias in a different room. Within one room it never changes, so you can still follow who said what.

• Your own alias is shown at the top of the room
• Rejoining the same room gives you the same alias again
• There is no way to compare aliases from two different rooms and tell they belong to the same person

Only the server can compute an alias. Even someone who knows your account cannot work out your alias to check whether you are in a given room.

Anonymity here is not just a changed name. Everything that would identify a person is hidden too: profile pictures, linked channels, badges, and online status are all withheld in an open chat.

• Tapping a member shows the alias and nothing else — there is no way through to their account or channel
• You cannot start a 1:1 conversation or send a friend request to an open chat member
• Cosmetics such as titles, nickname colors, and avatar frames are hidden as well, because a rare combination is a fingerprint on its own

The owner can change the room title and the notice, remove members, and take down messages in the room. The owner's member list has no real accounts in it either — removals and bans all point at an alias.

• A removal can carry a re-entry ban, either for a set period or permanently
• The ban list is shown by alias too, and bans are lifted from there
• Reporting a member or a message is open to everyone, not just the owner
• If operations close a room, new messages and new joins stop and the reason appears in the room notice. Members who were already in can stay and read the past conversation

The owner can delete the whole room. Deleting it removes the conversation and the membership with it, and it cannot be undone.

When a report comes in, operations can act on the real account behind the alias. Anonymity hides you from other users; it is not permission to break the rules.