ISHMAEL N. DARO
News Writer

    For about two months, talking to strangers has been all the rage.

    The reason for this is the meteoric rise of Chatroulette, the Internet’s latest chat site. It matches you up with random strangers around the world. Users can communicate via webcam and microphone or simply through text, although without a camera you’re likely to get “nexted.”

    Indeed, that is one of the defining features of Chatroulette: if you don’t like what you see, you simply click “Next” and get matched up with someone else.

    In an age of ever-increasing interconnectedness with sites like Facebook and Twitter, Chatroulette is a refreshing splash of anonymity. It even resembles early Internet chat services in which strangers simply spoke to other strangers across the world, often looking for a sexual connection.

A brief spin through Chatroulette will have its mix of nudity, some of it mild, most of it downright scandalous. However, unlike traditional chat rooms, typing “asl” to ask for someone’s age, sex and location will get you suspended for 10 minutes.

    The service is relatively young and has only gained in popularity in the last several weeks. Started by Andrey Ternovskiy, a Russian teenager who wanted a new way to chat with his friends, the site soon gained a following and its user base exploded. Ternovskiy, 17, built and maintains the site by himself but he has already attracted the attentions of people in the tech industry with deep pockets.

    Ternovskiy told the New York Times that he never advertised his site, “but somehow, people started to talk to each other about the site. And the word started to spread. That’s how the simultaneous user count grew from 10 to 50, then from 50 to 100 and so on.”

    Chatroulette’s website shows there are “more than 20,000” users online at any given time, but the real figure is likely much higher, perhaps in the millions. That means that Chatroulette offers users the chance to come face to face with over a million strangers (or their genitals) all around the world.

    I tried my luck at Chatroulette and got a mixed bag. My first stranger was a young man in his 20s looking disinterestedly at the camera, a cigarette tucked behind his ear. After saying hello and not getting a response, I clicked next.

    A blank screen. I clicked next.

    Another blank screen. This time I waited and repeatedly asked if anyone was on the other side. Suddenly the blank screen changed and revealed a man’s erection. I clicked next.

    On my next try, a friendly wave hello merited me an immediate disconnection. As did the next five tries. At this point, I almost wished for the erection to come back on screen. At least it didn’t skip me so cruelly.

    One last try, and I got matched up with a blonde 19-year-old woman with hoop earrings taking long drags from her cigarette between one-word responses. She was from Turkey.

    I asked her why she used Chatroulette, but she just stared back at me in boredom before disconnecting. It seems no one really knows why they go on Chatroulette. They just do.
   
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