IRC

IRC is the backchannel behind the hackspace, people are constantly connected and chatting there.

It's one of the best ways to get quickly acquainted with the regular crew, and lemonparty.

Connecting to the IRC Channel

Use the webchat client that runs in your browser.
Or point your IRC client at #london-hack-space on irc.freenode.net.

If you've not used IRC before there are many tutorials out there for you. [1] [2] [3] [4]

If you're unsure of IRC etiquette, this guide might be worth a glance. More irritable users tend to get annoyed at away messages, so you may want to find out how to turn this off.

A good option for members is to set up a screen session on babbage to run Irssi so that you don't miss anything (unless someone faceplants and restarts babbage). [5] is a good guide to using screen and Irssi.

Channel Rules

All paying members get ops in the channel.
The channel is generally NSFW, just so you know.
Logging is permitted, but please don't publish any logs.
If you ask for credit card numbers, you will get kicked.
If you ask for SMTP servers, you will get kicked.
If you ask HOW TO HAX, you will get kicked.
If you pester/abuse the bots, you will get kicked.
In fact, you're going to have to work very hard to stay alive, Nick.

Channel Bots

There are a couple of utility bots in the channel.

Robonaut is an instance of Irccat running on Babbage. All paying members can add commands to him. Code for these is uploaded to Github.
Earlbot is an instance of earlbot running somewhere in the intertubes. He lets you know what's hidden behind links, and if they're OLDE.

Statistics

For the perverse, see http://twigman.com/lhs.html or channel activity graphs