IRC is the most flexible and powerful way to chat online. It is all text based. As well as chatting, you can send private messages to each other, exchange pictures of your birds and other files, and get fancy by using colors. However, IRC does have it's problems. It is a very public forum.
Folks use tricks to mass advertize less than desirable channels and web sites.
On many IRC networks, your computer's IP address can be obtained and your computer could be attacked. There are exceptions to this and they are noted below. But, IRC is not all bad. It is still a good way to comunicate. There are a lot of channels availible to chat on.