A new internet phenomenon, fittingly titled Chat Roulette, dropped last November 2009. Created by the 17-year old Russian Andrey Ternovsky, this social website delivers exactly what its name promises: a risk- filled twist on current social networking sites. Ternovsky admits that the idea first dawned on him through his extensive use of Skype —Chat Roulette allows you to connect with strangers via webcam, text and audio.
The interactions are usually brief, sometimes just a glimpse before someone presses the next button; participation level is the user's choice.
Like roulette, the person that appears on the screen is completely random. Its users are diverse: a man in a leopard-print jumpsuit, college kids dancing to Crystal Castles and an older man sipping a beer and kissing his dog. Sometimes the random selection is amusing, others times it may be disturbing.
Although some contend that this site's bizarre and often offensive material makes it faddish, others see it as a new frontier in today's increasingly connected communications network.
I first used Chat Roulette about a week ago, having absolutely no idea what to expect. A bit squeamish, I dragged one of my roommates along with me for moral support. We were whisked away into the world of roulette and confronted by a girl crying over her spilled coffee, a stark-naked man running around his room, two Dutch college students who told us we should flash them and about 20 middle fingers (flicking-off and thumbs-up are two of the most popular images on the site).
It truly is an odd concept to be dropped into strangers' lives mid-scene. Yet this intimacy is offset by the fact that second encounters are rare and the interactions last only seconds.
What was most striking about these interactions was the thrill of randomness: the possibility of literally anything in the world being presented through that next webcam. The average user seems to be in their teens to mid-twenties, with males outnumbering females about 20 to one.
The big question surrounding this social medium is whether it will stick. The site has spread at a viral pace, now drawing up to 50,000 users. It raises certain ethical dilemmas for some: there is no real age limit placed (although Chat Roulette discourages users younger than 16), and it's an easy and fast way for sexual predators to expose themselves, taking voyeurism to the next level.
Questions of whether this media will become more refined begin to arise. There are a few trajectories this site can take; either it could become a total exercise in voyeurism and become yet another dating/pornography site, it could exist in its current state as an amusing set of interactions between some normal, some odd and some depraved individuals, or it could be reworked into a more accepted and modified website. In the next few months we will begin to see these changes that will decide Chat Roulette's importance as a new social medium.
