I like to apply tournament-style chess etiquette to RHP games. This means, at the beginning, wishing the opponent good luck and then keeping a poker face and saying essentially nothing until the game is over, after which I thank him for the game, complementing him on aspects of his play that deserve it.
The whole point of chess etiquette is to provide a polite, quiet game situation to allow both players to concentrate without distraction. The result of proper application of this would be opponents who retain their willingness to play you again in the future.
There is nothing really wrong if both players want to keep up a constant chatter. There are similarities there to basketball's trash-talking. If that's what you like that is your prerogative. But as for me, I just ignore almost all mid-game comments, leaving mine until after the game. This is what I teach the students in my chess club and what I like to apply when playing on RHP.
Is there any way to turn off messaging during the game, except for resigning, draw offer, etc? I've practically given up playing on ICC because of their inability to control jerks who specialize in verbal abuse. They give you a formula to turn them off during the game, but these guys can't stop themselves from writing long, abusive messages that pop up after the game. I hadn't played on there for a long time (even tho im a member), using uchess instead, but then when uchess wasn't working properly I thought I'd play over on ICC. Big mistake! It's as if these jerks couldn't wait to crawl out of their holes. IMO verbal abuse during a game is much more serious than disclosing a message log.
I would say in general, it isn't a good idea to broadcast private correspondence. It is more to do with net-iquette rather than anything else. If you asked the person "Is it alright if I broadcast this publically?" then I cannot see anything wrong with it.
Agreed that all electronic correspondance should be treated as if it was written to you on a postcard, but equally it is bad form if someone writes you a postcard and then you shout what that person just said on the rooftops on a megaphone without that writer's permission. That person wrote those messages with the idea that you are the only person reading it. Yes, what was said in this particular conversation is quite harmless, but how do you know for sure that what is considered a harmless statement could be harmful in other ways in the future? If we say it is okay to broadcast something that is "apparently" harmless, where do we draw the line?
Just my humble opinion. 🙂
Lau