How about some sort of chat system that uses IRC on the backend? This would enable people to use something other than a browser window if they wished, which are constantly being refreshed and restarted. I’m not familiar with any java applets that could be put on the site to allow access, but I know there’s a lot of options out there. Personally, I use Trillian, which makes it a snap to add irc chats to monitor, something I used to do a lot of. Of course IRC has it’s own set of drawbacks as well, so it’s understandable if you want to stay away from it.