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For the third [Edit: OOPS, my bad, fifth] time in three months I got caught up in a conversation tonight with a newbie cook trying to understand why something didn't work. For lack of a better way to communicate, we had a long conversation in comments.

Yes, I have a long history of raising baby birds in my bathroom sink. That doesn't make me wrong, just a bit soft-hearted.

Can't we at least give a poster with some small amount of rep the privilege to invite a no-rep poster to join them in chat? Or into a chat room?

Personally, at least here on SA, I'm not seeing a great harm in allowing 1 rep users to enter normal chat. Offensive posts and spam are hardly a problem running amok. Nor do I think that regular chat users tend towards being virgin eared.

The rep requirement to enter chat causes a lot more problems than just eliminating the requirement.

I don't see any good reason for a rep requirement to enter chat. Why keep the requirement at all?

EDIT: I remember one of my very first posts here. I don't remember what it was about, but I remember another user (who I will not name, but that name starts with SAJ) saying something to the effect of, "Your question doesn't deserve an upvote, but I'm upvoting you anyway so we can continue this conversation in chat." Since then, I've done the same thing - a few times. That's a flaw in the system, not a flaw in the users.

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    I don't think you see quite all of the offensive posts, so it's probably better to have some sort of low bar than no bar at all, but I agree that I would like to be able to directly yank someone into chat when it's completely obvious that we can help them.
    – Cascabel Mod
    Dec 22, 2013 at 15:40
  • I think it's basically "they're committed enough to not spam up the place". Besides, really, chat privileges are what, 20 points? I don't see you making a case for this being an actual problem here or on a different SE site, it's just a thing that bothered you lately. (By problem I mean something that makes it hard for SE to "do its job".) In your comment debate you could've as part of your nurturing told the new user they should answer a few questions to get chat privileges to have a more convenient way of interacting with other users.
    – millimoose
    Dec 24, 2013 at 3:31
  • I realize that the control we have over the actual workings of the SE system is almost nil, but: Perhaps a system could be devised where users could get "tokens" for every 500 (or whatever) rep that would allow them to invite others to chat? Or just give people with rep over a certain level the ability to invite others to chat.
    – SourDoh
    Dec 24, 2013 at 19:14
  • I believe letting a low-rep user into a chat room is something mods can already do, seems like it could be given to 3k or 5k users, too.
    – derobert
    Dec 25, 2013 at 5:24
  • @derobert if we can do it, I am not aware of it. But I will try the superping next time we have a good case for it, just to see if it works.
    – rumtscho Mod
    Dec 29, 2013 at 20:19
  • @rumtscho I think one of the U&L mods managed to pull it off, pretty sure it's doable somehow...
    – derobert
    Dec 29, 2013 at 20:23

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