DiscorD101
learn how to get around in the dark-default chat tool that everyone is talking about
Why is it like that?
originally, Discord was built for gamers
See that cute smiley face? It’s supposed to look like a handheld game controller, like for an XBox, maybe.
So it was built with gamer features
Here are just a few of the key features that you’ll meet. We won’t talk about moderation or bots very much in this class.
Dark Theme
It has a dark-first theme. That dark background keeps from ruining the night vision that you get from operating in a dark-and-detailed computer world.
Users Have Roles
People are organized, too. From a moderator’s viewpoint, roles allow fine levels of control over who has access to what. From a user viewpoint, roles allow you to categorize yourself to tell others about you and to customize your experience. Those groupings allow you to connect with the people you want in a big server.
Voice Chat and Streaming
It was built to let gamers talk with each other and even stream their games to show each other while still playing the games.
Strong Moderation
Owners and administrators of a server have a lot of power to set rules and maintain them. There can be several levels of authority, to help spread the load.
However, you can moderate your own experience by muting channels you don’t want to engage with, and setting your profile to do-not-disturb.
Categories, Channels, and Threads
Well-organized conversations. There are broad topics (categories) and subtopics where the conversation happens (channels). The lowest tier (threads) can be user-created and it disappears if no one uses them, and is only visible to people active in the conversation. Different sections can be hidden from different users.
Bots
Running a server is a lot of work. There are hundreds of bots available (mostly written by volunteers) to automate some of that work. There are fun ones and serious ones but unless you’re running a server you’ll probably only encounter them when they do something for you. Think of them as computer programs that can be called on for repetitive tasks.
But then everyone else noticed…
You’ll learn about how to use the tools that Discord built for gamers to give yourself a better experience: more streamlined, less overwhelming and confusing, so you can be where you want to be when you want.
Sound Good?
join us August 5,
2pm Pacific time
The tools built for gamers turned out to be useful for the gamers’ outside projects, their organizing, their friend circles, staying connected in the pandemic, watching movies together with your cross-country partner, sharing information, collaboration, and special interests from historic sewing to electronics to writing romance when Twitter fell apart.
Gamers are a demanding lot, which means that the tools they stick with are the ones that stay on a rapid development cycle. They get better fast. They evolve with the needs. And so a company built for gaming became a company built for a whole lot more.
People who didn’t like it had choices: facebook groups, Mighty Networks, Slack. So Discord was free to develop for a tight and specific audience, and do it well.