Just six weeks ago a I read about Chatroulette, the new site that asks you to turn on your web cam then presents  you at random to folks all over the world who have turned on their web cams too. You can choose to chat, or not.  A diabolically simple idea. And it has taken off like wildfire:

The genre makes Youtube feel absolutely ossified. It is completely spontaneous and giddy because the next person could be interesting, or not.

I am sure it was more exciting a few weeks ago when relatively sane curiosity seekers were the majority there. Today, unfortunately, Chatroulette is over populated with guys doing in front of their webcam what they would be arrested for if they did the same thing in the park down the street. Chatroulette is an assault on the senses: it gets pretty awful, pretty fast.

Just the same the genre is compelling and I braved the assault to find a couple of interesting people to chat with. The massive uptick in traffic is unprecedented for one site. But the phenomena is not dissimilar to that of chat rooms in the 90s. Compelling, intriguing, they too, were quickly overrun by pervs. Still the concept of a chat room persisted and when corralled into topic areas and policed by moderators and users alike the pervs found other haunts on the web. I believe that this genre will follow the same path. It is just too giddy not to.