Issues with Chat and News

[Zhatt]

The biggest annoyance I'm having with the game right now is the chat.

When there are a fair number of people online the chat can move quite fast, especially when you're trying to coordinate your empire.

One issue is that every time you want to check a message, you have to open the chat window and then to the right tab. It doesn't sound like much (two clicks), but after I read a message, I'll go back to my city window, and then someone else sends a message which I check, then back to the city, message, city, etc.

It would be nice if it at least kept the last tab you were using open. Even better would be a separate chat window or the like.

I know I can see the chat in other areas, but that's the other issue. The chat notifications show up in at least three different places and it's not consistent. Sometimes it shows up in the bottom left part of the window, some times in the bottom right log and sometimes in the news icon that pops up. And when it does show up in the news, it usually shows the line of chat in duplicate or even triplicate.

Regarding the newspaper icon; since most of the chat ends up there (which I read in the chat tab), I'm usually ignoring the icon which means that I'll usually miss any actual news. Why is there a newspaper icon in the first place? Shouldn't all important events have their own icons? All lesser news could show up in the bottom left log.

Edit:
As mentioned in another thread, a time stamp on the chat would be great.

[Bantams]

If you click on a civ that isnt youres and select chat it chats with youre civ and not them that also needs fixing

[peter grimes]

To further the issues with the Chat interface:

When coming into a conversation late, I have to scroll to the top. Would be more convenient if the window opened to the first unread in whichever tab.

But then, once I've scrolled up, the screen automatically drops down the moment someone else adds to the chat -- and I have to scroll all the way back up. In other words, it seems as if the chat window is defaulting to 'newest post' instead of 'first unread post'

And I'd do away with the auto-quotes and 'says': they add nothing and only serve to distract the eye from the message:

PeterG says:"let's change civics!'".

becomes

PeterG: let's change civics!