This article investigates the dyad-based communication of two groups of non-native speakers (NNSs) of English involved in real time interaction in a type of text-based computer-mediated communication (CMC) tool known as a MOO. The object of this semester long study was to examine the ways in which the subjects managed their L2 interaction during task-based discourse. Four task types were implemented: information-gap, jigsaw, decision-making and opinion-exchange. Analysis of the transcripts indicates that the learners employed a number of communication strategies including definition and clarification requests. In addition, the subjects utilized confirmation and comprehension checks. Further strategies employed were self-correction and non-response. These strategies were more frequent in the opinion-exchange and jigsaw tasks than in the other task types. I found evidence that the above strategies were deployed to maintain target language interaction. Moreover, although instances of negotiation of meaning took place they were infrequent in the corpus as a whole. In this article, I examine the deployment of the above strategies during the project and discuss possible motivations for their utilization. In addition, I investigate the influence of task type on the interaction. The analysis suggests that factors including proficiency levels, task, the nature of real time communication in the online medium and sociocultural factors contributed to the absence of negotiation in much of the data. (Contains 3 tables and 7 notes. Appended are: (1) Interaction Management Strategy Use During Task-based Interaction; (2) Task Type, Total Turns and Turns Involving Interaction Management Strategies; (3) Task Type, Total Number of Turns, Turns Involving Strategy Use and Negotiation; (4) An unedited example of the interaction collected in week six of this study; and (5) Orientation Phase Communication and Navigation Task (Week 1).)