How does communication/chat work?

So far every mmo I've played had some sort of zone/general chat or at least some sort of channels to easily chat to lots of people in your vicinity, yet I can't manage to find anything of the sort in this game? I heard about linkshells, but I really don't understand the concept, can someone give me a general outline of how I'm supposed to talk to people?

Zone wide chat
/shout <message>
or
/sh <message>

Linkshells
Basically one big chat group all the time no matter what zone you are in. You can type /linkshell <enter> and you will stay in that mode permanently until you type some other mode.