Nostalgia: LiveJournal's Greatest Fuck-Ups.

[stewardess]

Since July, 2007, when I decided to migrate from LiveJournal to the bullshit-free land of InsaneJournal, folks have asked me, "Hey, Stewardess, aren't you worried the majority of fandom/porn writers/lolcat communities will stay at LiveJournal

Comments

[cocoajava]

Something to keep in mind, by the way.

BellaOnline.com
About.com
Delphi.com
CompuServe.com
GreatestJournal.com
livejournal.com

At one time, each of these sites was considered a wonderful resource and/or gathering place for various fandoms. Over time, each of them began to methodically screw over it's users in an attempt to keep clawing it's way to success. That's only a partial list. It's only a list of place I personally was impacted by. I worked for some of those sites, and what goes on behind the scenes would make you scream.

If you place all your hopes and faith in the Next Best Thing, which at the moment is IJ, I can only advise doing so with your reality-radar firmly in place.

The only way to avoid bullshit on the web, is to log off and go back to pen and paper. I *know* this, and I still choose to have an internet lifestyle. But I'm aware and informed of the foundations I perch my existence on.

What 6A is doing is screwed up. But they're not the first to do so and they won't be the last. Just a word of caution to keep in mind.

[helsmeta]

*agrees*

IJ is covered with ads and butt-ugly. Free users are limited in ways that I never realized an LJ-based site could limit users (IE, they've turned off S2 comment pages for free users).

But seriously: it is covered with ads, as was GreatestJournal. I think people who have paid accounts (and/or AdBlock) forget that. I've loaded up IJ in IE a couple of times and run screaming. If that were my main experience with the site, I wouldn't still be there. If I couldn't use Stylish to overwrite the terrible site schemes, I wouldn't still be there. I don't like the fact that I have to overwrite site schemes to get a legible site, and of course I can't overwrite the site scheme on my phone's mini-browser.

I'm not expecting Squeaky to hold out doing this forever. Brad didn't, and Brad had a lot more in the way of programming skills, I think, and more commitment to open-source. I'm honestly not sure what's going to happen from here, but I don't think IJ is what's going to save us -- it's far too much of a downgrade from LJ.

[cocoajava]

I'm a free user at IJ, and yep. That butt is ugly! Squeaky is a hell of a neat guy, and he's doing what seems to be right for everyone involved, right now. But he's in a period of explosive growth, and may be faced with some interesting choices in days to come. Some of them could be lucrative for him. Gold can be blindingly shiny stuff, and eventually when it's glare is dimmed, a no-longer-goldenchild website can become a bitter bitter place. I hope this never happens to Squeaky. I've seen it happen enough times to make me simply pause and watch, though.

BTW, I am not by nature a pessimist. I am a realist, though. :)

[pferde]

I wouldn't use IJ if I didn't have adblock. Then again I wouldn't use the internet at all if I didn't have adblock. As for siteschemes, yeah some are ugly but on the other hand the new ones are okay, and readable. I don't much care what colour a website is, only that it's functional, readable and does what I want it to do.

Free users are limited in ways that I never realized an LJ-based site could limit users (IE, they've turned off S2 comment pages for free users).
Wasn't that always the case with LJ anyway? I don't recall ever having the option of showing comment pages in journal style except when I had a paid account.

[elfwreck]

IJ doesn't have a policy that you're violating the TOS if you block the ads. The key difference between LJ's ads and IJ's (and GJ's, and most other sites') is that LJ wants active partnerships with their advertisers... they want restrict content that the advertisers don't approve of.

I agree with the ugly, though. The new "worksafe" scheme is tolerable, but I miss Dystopia when I'm on IJ.

I don't think IJ is fandom's best home in the long run; it's not going to (and shouldn't) twist itself to match fandom's specific wants and needs. I've got hopes for the OTW, but know that anything like a journal service is a long ways off.

[pferde]

I agree. Except that you can still stay online and avoid the screw-overs by self-installing something like Wordpress on your own domain and server. The best thing is always "Do It Yourself".

(Which I would, if I had an ounce of technical know-how, which I don't).

[cocoajava]

True that, but you'd be fangirling in a vacuum, and I think most of us enjoy the social aspects of it all. And starting up your own fandom site and allowing access by other users, well... that just makes you yet another fandom site on the web, and you become part of the machine.

I'm a hybrid in some ways - outside of fandom, I run http://cocoajava.com at my own domain, but I also have an LJ community tied to it, for my readers to chatter in. How's that for a moosh-up? :)

[pferde]

I think most of us enjoy the social aspects of it all

Thats also true. And I do similar to you for similar reasons; I have a wordpress blog (which is mainly for friends and family & work colleagues who want to read without having to sign up for anything or log in anywhere) plus the LJ and the IJ as well for friends who do.

[stewardess]

I'm well aware IJ has drawbacks. For me, 6A's horribleness outweighs the pain of moving to what will likely be a temporary platform.

I see the list of failed sites as a reason to be optimistic. It's a reminder that the businesses who do not meet their customers' expectations will croak, making space for the new. LiveJournal is not our only choice for staying in touch with friends; there are many options now, and there will be more. Soon, I hope, an option so attractive will appear that reasons for staying at LiveJournal will evaporate -- because everyone will move. I don't expect it to happen overnight (unless LiveJournal does something helpful such as eliminate all NC-17 content posted without a friendslock), but it will happen. I find that an encouraging thought. ;)

[cocoajava]

It could, wait, no it will happen, technology constantly marches on! The main group of friends that keeps me tied to LJ started originally on usenet. The migration out was slow, but it happened. It'll happen again.

I like that you found the optimistic spin on my list. That's good for me to hear - I'm still smarting from the kick in the ass most of them gave me. Another POV is good.