Any webmasters here have 24/7 tech/chat support?
 

So I just got a new phone, and I'm loving this new full keyboard. I'm with verizon, and I get unlimited txt's. Right now, my other admin can chat with me using MSN, which allows him to send txt's to me, and receive my replies. It's 100% free for both of us.

To begin, I just run a random forum with over 10,000 members which is mainly centered around random topics, and is not out to sell any services or make any money. I just do this for a hobby.

I was just thinking, there are plenty of services out there that provide for SMS plugins for your website, but the good ones are never free. So I was thinking, I might be able to write a program that uses MSN's protocol that can run on my linux box, and it would allow any member of my forum to communicate with me with a custom chat client that I'd write. It would also have administrative features like me replying with two special commands, that would allow me to block abusers, and another one to kick/end their session. Hardest part for me would be integrating the program with some sort of php scipt.

I was wondering if anyone has seen this, or knows a much better free alternative? If I decide to do it this summer, I'm going to integrate it with the vBulletin forums and I'm sure I'll post the mod on here for no charge.

What's your take on this?

I'd dig it.

I love my website, but just as I don't feel like being on a phone leash and thus don't give out my cell phone number, I'm not about to be on a leash to my site users. When I'm off the computer, I'm off the computer.

Amen! Bad enough that friends haven't a clue when they're interrupting your private life, but to open yourself up to a board's membership like that is a sure fire way of ensuring you'll NEVER EVER get a romantic moment again. :D

My board is a closely-knit group of members. Most the members have been registered for 2-3 years, and I'd say a good 50% of the members are actually locals that I know.


With this, they wouldn't see your phone number, it would act just like any chat client. Besides, I could always set certain usergroups to be able to access this, like the VIP or something.

I suspect it'd be quite difficult to integrate with MSN messenger's voice chat protocol. As far as I know it's not documented.

I'm not looking to do voice chat, just basic text messaging.

I will move to a good customer service and a nice marketing department... 24/7? maybe later but on India!!!

never have voice-chat will ease your life and your family mood.

i have staff from around the world, so when i sleep, someone else can handle support... nobody work 24/7, they try to have one guy online all the time, that's all... that's the only detail i have for my big sites.

I'm working on a little plug-in/mod that sends your PM's to your cell phone as a text message... the way it's set up only admin's (and maybe super moderators) will be able to see the phone number...

I think you're out of your mind if you are going to offer 24/7 text support when you actually have nothing to support. You said that you do this as a hobby, and that you don't actually sell any services.

So what are you offering support for? The use of vBulletin? You're going to highly regret it. People will abuse it to become more "buddy buddy" with you, you'll obviously get messages at all hours of the night, it would pretty much eliminate any purpose of having a PM inbox.. which is a feature you paid for when buying vBulletin.

I think it's stupid. You don't need to devote your entire life to a hobby forum. Even if it was a business, you don't need to devote your life to it. You need spare time, get out with friends.. socialize. Don't spend your life on the computer, you'll regret it in record time.

I guess it's not really tech support, but more of a chat room for me really. I just thought some people could use it as tech support. Besides, even though its 24/7, I set my phone to alarm only when I sleep, so nobody is going to wake up.

isn't called Twitter?

I don't want to bother with twitter though.