Chatroulette

After reading my cousin's post on Chatroulette I decided it sounded interesting enough to try. Check his post out here!
The idea behind this website is that you peer through the webcam of a total stranger, while they in turn see you. This is all anonymous, which brings out the freak in some people.

I encountered probably 40% French/Swiss people, 40% German/Austrian people, 10% unknown, 5% asian, and 5% American. This is only out of the people I corresponded with.... there are probably countless others in the mix. I'm guessing my mixture was heavily European because it was the afternoon/evening there. It was too late at night for me to catch Asians, and too early for America to be awake yet. I am thinking about trying it again during a different time to see who I can find.

I think I got pretty lucky with my first encounter, it was with a group of college guys in Seattle. They were home on Spring Break from college and came across pretty educated and mild. They asked about my stay in Korea, I asked them about their plans after college. We exchanged a couple of random college stories, then I decided it was time to see who else was waiting to be discovered. I typed a quick goodbye and pressed the "next" button.

I spent the next 10 minutes not interacting with anyone. Some cameras were black, so I would keep going, some were women who pushed "next" on me. I actually didn't speak with any women. I would have, but they always pushed next. I had an array of penis-cams. Luckily there is a "report" feature. I was ready for this after my cousin warned his readers, but it's still gross!!

After 10 mins and numerous faces flashing past my screen, I stopped on a screen of a man playing an instrument. I asked, "Mandolin?" After another minute of playing he replied "balalakia." This spawned our conversation about music, Russian instrumenets, and lead me to discover he lives 10 minutes from my old house in Germany. We actually hung out at the same bars during the same time period. I never saw his face, so I'm not sure who he was or if there was a slight chance I could have met him. It was an interesting conversation none-the-less. I said goodbye and started clicking my way to finding someone else to speak to.

Not long after that, I came across a screen with a piece of paper (and fingers) that said "wave please." I waved. Then he held up a piece of paper that said "Thank you" with a smiley face. I thought that was a unique way to interact of this site. I wonder how many people wave at him? I wonder if that's a project for school, his own curiosity, or some random fetish??? Who knows.

Some of my conversations were in a mixture of their broken English and my broken French or German.

Overall I would give this website a B-. If there was a way to not see dick-cams I would want to do it again for sure. I think the idea behind the website is great. Not only does it expand our world outside our normal little bubble, but it gives us a chance to peer into the worlds of other people. Not often can you visit a home in Switzerland, France, Germany, China, and Russia all in one night. The best cure for hate is education. A website like this has the potential to teach people that although people may speak a different language, or live in a house that looks a little different, that underneath the exterior we are all just people, curious about the world.