It was never intended to be a full chat, but rather a "shout" box for people to stop in and give a shout out to each other. We had it at the top when we first added it, but more and more people were using it to ask questions that were better suited for the forums.

And we can't archive chats to be searchable to new users, so valuable advice was being lost in the chat area, that we preferred to remain in the forums.

We intentionally put it at the bottom, so that it was available for folks who enjoyed it, without making it the focus of BP.net - as we never intended it to be a main part of BP.net, but rather an a accessory if you will.