Posty Mc Post Post!
Yes, you heard me I'm posting!
POST POST POST!!!!
I protesting this protest!
I am not counting on this changing anyone's opinion. I simply want to explain my beleifs that I am firmly rooted in. So don't even bother trying to argue with any of my points. I will delete your comment. This is not censorship this is me choosing to do with my property what I will which I have every right to do.
First let me restablish the goals of this strike:
The strike has four terms:
1. Restore basic accounts for new account creation.
2. Inform users before any change to the site that affects how we use the site or demands on our resources.
3. Run change proposals by the Advisory Board and take their advice into account before implementation of any change.
4. Homophobia, misogyny, and racism must not be a part of the decision making processes about appropriate content of the site, including what user interests are deemed appropriate.
Now let me tell you what I think of each of these:
My thoughts on the four terms:
1. A programmer's got to eat too. Plus what do you care if new memebers have to view ads? So the game is that you want to make new accounts that are ad free? Well, they said they were trying to work out a way to make that possible. I don't begrudge them wanting to make a little more money off the site. Usually businesses use the extra to invest in ways to increase their business which is not necessarily bad for LJ. I'm willing to let them pay their employees what they deserve. I'm also willing to see what they will do with their profits, in what ways it will benefit the users. And lastly, they have the right to do so. They own the company. Which is more reason than b/c you just don't like ads... or change... With that said I think this term is unbelievably selfish and childish and those who are grubbing for free and ad free accounts should be embarrassed to be acting so immaturely. Got news for you kids, nothing is free!
2. I agree that it was rude of SUP to slip this one under the radar. They did not lie to us; they did say it was a business move. However, they still have the right to do this. Especially since, the theory is that uses are going to keep their journals and have no need of new journals. So in theory we did not need to be informed of this. But again I thought it was rude. By the way how does this effect the way we use the site? How are you effected? You do realise that your username represents you. So how was your account effected? It wasn't. As to resources... What are you referring to? What resources? Your money? The fraction of a second of time that will be used for an ad to load? I think this is just thrown in there to make the situation sound worse.
3. Again, agree on this one. If they're going to make an "Advisory Panel" they should listen to it. I think the flaw here is that they misled everyone as to the full power of the panel. I don't think that the panel has full force. It's merely a way to get the people's voice heard. They have no actual power. Think about it. Are you really going to listen to the selfish suggestions of thousands of people if its not in your best interest? Probably not. If everyone told you to sell your house and give them the money would you do it? Just b/c a panel representing thousands of people told you to. Right. They wanted us to feel like we had control. When we never did. It was a misrepresentation of the role of the advisory panel and that is dishonest. However, we all are using this site of our own free will AND we signed the terms and conditions (it doesn't matter if they change, that's perfectly legal, every business has the right to change the TOS at ANY time). They still have the right to ignore our suggestions.
4. Homophobia, misogyny, and racism. I have no clue where this is coming from! This is another wild accusation that has been tacked on to make your accusations sound worse. I read the topics specically left off the popular interests page were "sex," "depression," "bisexuality," "faeries," and "fanfiction". First of all where's the misogyny? Where's the racism? And as for homophobia... This suggest that they don't want anything to do with sex in their interests list; not just homosexuality, not just bisexuality, ALL sexuality. And to be quite honest I agree here. First of all there are users that are minors. Hence the implementation of flagging content and putting it behind a cut. I feel they have a responsibility to censor these topics from the youthful eyes of minors. Plus, come on we all know society is obsessed with sex. Do we really need to plaster it on the front page of LJ? I think it would be rather innapropriate to put it up there. What happened to people's sense of decency? As for those other topics making it up there... They still have the right to not include them. The list of popular topics not only represents us it represents THEM too! They can decide to do that. This website is their property! And they can choose what is said or not said on their property. You wouldn't let anyone write "I'm a big fat whore on the side of your house" and so neither would SUP allow things it disagreed with to be put on the front page of their website. For crying out loud, they have the right to remove half of your journal if they see fit. Not to mention they could just eliminate the whole popular interests section! Besides, its all irrelevent b/c tons of people don't even include interests in their bio. And statistically there are probably more people who DON'T include the before mentioned interestes in thier bio. And they deserve to be represented also. I'm not going into the mathematics of it but trust me the popular interests can represent a minority if the majority has nothing opposite to list.
My bottomline is that this protest is petty and uncalled for. The only thing they've done wrong is misrepresent the role of the"Advisory Panel" and - rudely - make changes w/o announcing them. But they have the right not to listen to the Advisory Panel and they have the right to make unannounced changes. The other accounts are based on selfish desires. (That I might also add are dillusional since if you think you're going to get things free forever you're sorely mistaken. This has been long in coming but its due.)
I don't know how this turned into a "sense of LJ community"... It sounds more like an agry mob, mobbing for the sake of mobbing than a reasonable protest. You're demands are NOT reasonable or within the law. They have the law on their side. And therefore you have NO power. I've got news for you. Yeah they can't succeed without users (perhaps even the current users, that's a discussion for another day) but we sure as hell can't have LJ without them. They can take their servers and destroy their contents. They can unsubscribe from whatever hosting their paying for and have the data deleted. They can spitefully hold on to the livejournal.com domain name forever. What has happened to your community then? And so why bite the hand that feeds you?
You know you can't do anything to change this. They are within their legal rights. You can leave but where does that put you? At square one. And w/ another blogging site that WON'T cater to your every desire. Either work with what they are willing to give you (which by the way I think they are being rather generous, I've never seen a company that makes special provisions like this for the users that existed before they bought the company) or leave and start over under some worse oppression.
So I am protesting b/c I think SUP, while having committed a few social trangressions, is within their rights. I know progress is progress and you can't stand in the way of it (seriously, has no one paid attention in history class?). I also know that life isn't prefect and just b/c LJ consists of a bunch of words it doesn't make it some storybook fantasy where everyone gets what they want, just b/c its all written doesn't mean its not still life. Life is about forgiveness and compromise and compassion. Three things I'm not seeing here at LJ. And because the "LiveJournal Community" that everyone is so proudly rallying around is being greedy, petty, and spiteful (not to mention dillusional). I am embarrassed that I am a member of the LiveJournal community, in that I am a LiveJournal user. I do not want these attributes pinned to me as well. And therefore I protest the protest.
POST POST POST!!!!
I protesting this protest!
I am not counting on this changing anyone's opinion. I simply want to explain my beleifs that I am firmly rooted in. So don't even bother trying to argue with any of my points. I will delete your comment. This is not censorship this is me choosing to do with my property what I will which I have every right to do.
First let me restablish the goals of this strike:
The strike has four terms:
1. Restore basic accounts for new account creation.
2. Inform users before any change to the site that affects how we use the site or demands on our resources.
3. Run change proposals by the Advisory Board and take their advice into account before implementation of any change.
4. Homophobia, misogyny, and racism must not be a part of the decision making processes about appropriate content of the site, including what user interests are deemed appropriate.
Now let me tell you what I think of each of these:
My thoughts on the four terms:
1. A programmer's got to eat too. Plus what do you care if new memebers have to view ads? So the game is that you want to make new accounts that are ad free? Well, they said they were trying to work out a way to make that possible. I don't begrudge them wanting to make a little more money off the site. Usually businesses use the extra to invest in ways to increase their business which is not necessarily bad for LJ. I'm willing to let them pay their employees what they deserve. I'm also willing to see what they will do with their profits, in what ways it will benefit the users. And lastly, they have the right to do so. They own the company. Which is more reason than b/c you just don't like ads... or change... With that said I think this term is unbelievably selfish and childish and those who are grubbing for free and ad free accounts should be embarrassed to be acting so immaturely. Got news for you kids, nothing is free!
2. I agree that it was rude of SUP to slip this one under the radar. They did not lie to us; they did say it was a business move. However, they still have the right to do this. Especially since, the theory is that uses are going to keep their journals and have no need of new journals. So in theory we did not need to be informed of this. But again I thought it was rude. By the way how does this effect the way we use the site? How are you effected? You do realise that your username represents you. So how was your account effected? It wasn't. As to resources... What are you referring to? What resources? Your money? The fraction of a second of time that will be used for an ad to load? I think this is just thrown in there to make the situation sound worse.
3. Again, agree on this one. If they're going to make an "Advisory Panel" they should listen to it. I think the flaw here is that they misled everyone as to the full power of the panel. I don't think that the panel has full force. It's merely a way to get the people's voice heard. They have no actual power. Think about it. Are you really going to listen to the selfish suggestions of thousands of people if its not in your best interest? Probably not. If everyone told you to sell your house and give them the money would you do it? Just b/c a panel representing thousands of people told you to. Right. They wanted us to feel like we had control. When we never did. It was a misrepresentation of the role of the advisory panel and that is dishonest. However, we all are using this site of our own free will AND we signed the terms and conditions (it doesn't matter if they change, that's perfectly legal, every business has the right to change the TOS at ANY time). They still have the right to ignore our suggestions.
4. Homophobia, misogyny, and racism. I have no clue where this is coming from! This is another wild accusation that has been tacked on to make your accusations sound worse. I read the topics specically left off the popular interests page were "sex," "depression," "bisexuality," "faeries," and "fanfiction". First of all where's the misogyny? Where's the racism? And as for homophobia... This suggest that they don't want anything to do with sex in their interests list; not just homosexuality, not just bisexuality, ALL sexuality. And to be quite honest I agree here. First of all there are users that are minors. Hence the implementation of flagging content and putting it behind a cut. I feel they have a responsibility to censor these topics from the youthful eyes of minors. Plus, come on we all know society is obsessed with sex. Do we really need to plaster it on the front page of LJ? I think it would be rather innapropriate to put it up there. What happened to people's sense of decency? As for those other topics making it up there... They still have the right to not include them. The list of popular topics not only represents us it represents THEM too! They can decide to do that. This website is their property! And they can choose what is said or not said on their property. You wouldn't let anyone write "I'm a big fat whore on the side of your house" and so neither would SUP allow things it disagreed with to be put on the front page of their website. For crying out loud, they have the right to remove half of your journal if they see fit. Not to mention they could just eliminate the whole popular interests section! Besides, its all irrelevent b/c tons of people don't even include interests in their bio. And statistically there are probably more people who DON'T include the before mentioned interestes in thier bio. And they deserve to be represented also. I'm not going into the mathematics of it but trust me the popular interests can represent a minority if the majority has nothing opposite to list.
My bottomline is that this protest is petty and uncalled for. The only thing they've done wrong is misrepresent the role of the"Advisory Panel" and - rudely - make changes w/o announcing them. But they have the right not to listen to the Advisory Panel and they have the right to make unannounced changes. The other accounts are based on selfish desires. (That I might also add are dillusional since if you think you're going to get things free forever you're sorely mistaken. This has been long in coming but its due.)
I don't know how this turned into a "sense of LJ community"... It sounds more like an agry mob, mobbing for the sake of mobbing than a reasonable protest. You're demands are NOT reasonable or within the law. They have the law on their side. And therefore you have NO power. I've got news for you. Yeah they can't succeed without users (perhaps even the current users, that's a discussion for another day) but we sure as hell can't have LJ without them. They can take their servers and destroy their contents. They can unsubscribe from whatever hosting their paying for and have the data deleted. They can spitefully hold on to the livejournal.com domain name forever. What has happened to your community then? And so why bite the hand that feeds you?
You know you can't do anything to change this. They are within their legal rights. You can leave but where does that put you? At square one. And w/ another blogging site that WON'T cater to your every desire. Either work with what they are willing to give you (which by the way I think they are being rather generous, I've never seen a company that makes special provisions like this for the users that existed before they bought the company) or leave and start over under some worse oppression.
So I am protesting b/c I think SUP, while having committed a few social trangressions, is within their rights. I know progress is progress and you can't stand in the way of it (seriously, has no one paid attention in history class?). I also know that life isn't prefect and just b/c LJ consists of a bunch of words it doesn't make it some storybook fantasy where everyone gets what they want, just b/c its all written doesn't mean its not still life. Life is about forgiveness and compromise and compassion. Three things I'm not seeing here at LJ. And because the "LiveJournal Community" that everyone is so proudly rallying around is being greedy, petty, and spiteful (not to mention dillusional). I am embarrassed that I am a member of the LiveJournal community, in that I am a LiveJournal user. I do not want these attributes pinned to me as well. And therefore I protest the protest.