Exciting new Talking Point feature launching in the New Year!

[KatherineW]

In the New Year, we are going to be piloting an exciting new service for Talking Point: a chat room, which will be open at set times for ‘live chat’ sessions.

What is a chat room?

A chat room, also known as ‘live chat’, simply means an online conversation that happens immediately. In other words, a chat room conversation is a bit quicker than the discussions that happen on the main Talking Point forum. A chat room also enables several people to contribute to a conversation within a short space of time.

Why have a chat room on Talking Point?

• A chat room enables people to have instant contact with each other – and provides another way of being in touch

• We’ll be facilitating regular chat sessions on specific aspects of dementia and dementia support, as well as an extra outlet for light-hearted and social conversations

• We’ll be providing extra sessions with special guests – for example, professionals in the dementia field, who can answer forum members’ questions

• Live chat is a feature that Talking Point members have requested over the past few years, so we’re keen to try it out!

How will the chat room work?

The Talking Point chat room will be an extra feature on Talking Point, and only Talking Point members will be able to access it. Initially, we plan for the chat room to be open at specific times, twice a week. One of the weekly sessions will be on a dementia-related topic, and the other will be a social session.

We also plan to host an additional ‘Ask the Experts’ session each month, which will feature an expert in the dementia field, or a special guest.

We’ll be piloting the chat room for six months in the first instance, and then asking you, Talking Point’s members, for your feedback about it.

Click here to see a preview of what Talking Point’s chat room will look like.

Thanks to everyone who shared your views about our chat room plans in our recent survey - much appreciated.

We'll be posting more about the chat room launch date very soon!

Katherine

 

[KatherineW]

I’m very pleased to let you know that we’ll be opening our new chat room next week: our first two live chat sessions will be held next Tuesday and Thursday, at lunchtime.

On Tuesday 21st January from 12 - 1pm, we’ll be running the first of what will be monthly live chat sessions for people with dementia. All Talking Point members who have dementia are very welcome to join the chat - whether you’d like to get involved in the conversation, have a read, or just see how the chat room works.

On Thursday 23rd January from 12 - 1pm, we’ll be running our first ‘Thursday Social’ chat session. Pop in to say Hello, have a natter to other members or simply take a look.

As I mentioned last month, the Talking Point chat room is a pilot project, which means we will be trying it out for a few months to see how it works, in the first instance. As the chat room is something we’ve not done before on Talking Point, it’s possible we might vary things along the way – for example, trying different times and formats for the chats. We’d welcome your feedback and ideas, so if you have any comments about the chat room, or suggestions for topics for future chat sessions, please do get in touch with us at talkingpoint@alzheimers.org.uk.

The only other thing to mention is that to visit the chat room, you’ll need to log in to Talking Point via a web browser, as it won’t be accessible via the mobile app (this is because our mobile app doesn’t support additional software such as chat).

We’ll post reminders ahead of all the chat sessions, and I look forward to chatting to some of you very soon!

 

[KatherineW]

Just a reminder that we'll be opening the Talking Point chat room this lunchtime.

From 12 - 1pm, we’ll be running the first of what will be monthly live chat sessions for people with dementia. All Talking Point members who have dementia are very welcome to join this chat - whether you’d like to get involved in the conversation, have a read, or just see how the chat room works.

Carers, relatives and friends of people with dementia are asked to hold off from visiting the chat room until Thursday at 12pm, when we'll be running our first ‘Thursday Social’ chat session. Pop in to say Hello, have a natter to other members or simply take a look.

Finding the chat room is easy: just click on the Chat room link on the blue bar at the top of the Talking Point page, as shown here.

Once you're in the chat room, you can click on the '?' symbol to read about how to get started - or we will talk you through it.

If you've any questions, either about these sessions or about the chat room in general, please get in touch with us at talkingpoint@alzheimers.org.uk.

 

[KatherineW]

A quick reminder that we'll be opening the Talking Point chat room again this lunchtime.

From 12 - 1pm, we'll be running our first ‘Thursday Social’ chat session. Pop in to say Hello, have a natter to other members or simply take a look.

Finding the chat room is easy: just click on the Chat room link on the blue bar at the top of the Talking Point page, as shown here.

Once you're in the chat room, you can click on the '?' symbol to read about how to get started - or we will talk you through it.

If you've any questions, either about these sessions or about the chat room in general, please get in touch with us at talkingpoint@alzheimers.org.uk.

 

[KatherineW]

Our chat room will be open from 12-1 today for our first Thursday Social - hope to see some of you in there!