The Semantic Web Services Interest Group has a channel on the FreeNode IRC Network, called #sws-ig.
The "scratchpad" is automatically generated from the discussions on this channel, thanks to a chump bot called.
The instructions for this bot are very simple, here are the most important ones (there is a complete manual if you need it).
The bot (called Gratibloko on #sws-ig) picks up on URLs and other keywords posted in the channel. The simplest thing to do is to post a URL in, on a line on its own, like this: http://foo.com/bar.html The bot will reply with a label, say A, like this: [gratibloko:#sws-ig] A:http://foo.com/bar.html from userjoe Now you can then append comments about that URL by typing: A:This is my comment The URL will appear as a raw URL in the output, unless you give it a title. To do so, add a comment with a pipe in front of it, like this: A:|Foo.com - home of all things fooish You can change this title simply by posted a new piped comment, which will automatically override the previous one. You can also use the Chump to post short notes that do not have a related URL. To start one of these, type: BLURB:My story about foo Again, the bot will assign a letter to this blurb, and you can add to it in the usual way. You can add an inline link (i.e., one within the text of a comment, rather than the title of a series of comments) using this markup: A:They also have [another site|http://foobar.com] ... this will make the words "another site" appear as a hyperlink to the URL immediately after them. One other useful feature is asking the bot what the status of posts is especially useful if you have been away from the channel for a while and want to catch up. By typing gratibloko:view ... the bot will show the titles and URLS of the last five (by default) posts. Alternatively, typing gratibloko:view 2 ... will just show the last two posts, and so on. If you forget any of this, ask the bot for help or more help: gratibloko:help gratibloko:morehelp These commands should be executed via querying the bot rather than in the public channel.