Membership FAQ
stormy_team moved to a moderated membership in 2009. Since then, we have processed 10,000+ applications and we still receive 20-30 applications daily. We are always trying to make this process as painless and as efficient as possible, so changes have been made along the way.
We know some of you have been asking questions and might be confused, so hopefully this FAQ we've written would be useful in answering them.
MEMBERSHIP FAQ
1. Why are you guys making it so hard for people to be a member of your community?
Read this.
2. How can I join?
Read this.
3. Why was I not accepted?
# Have you answered the two questions PROPERLY? Did you comment on the appropriate post? Do not comment anywhere else, because we wouldn't be able to find it. And don't PM/email us with your application - they will be ignored.
# Did you post in a language other than English? A few of you did this, and we're sorry, we may not be able to understand you, so please stick to English!
# Did you forget to login and post your comment as "anonymous"? Many of you actually did this. We can't approve you if we don't know who you are!
# We can't accept people using OpenID, Facebook ID, Twitter ID or Google ID because LJ can't accept them as community members. Please sign up for an LJ account and try again.
# Our home is Aibakaland where we have a minimum post/comment count requirement for members to view our subbed files. This is because we want to encourage them to be part of the community; to participate, and not just leech. Aibakaland members work hard to gain access to these files. It won't be fair if we don't do the same thing on LJ, based on your LJ post and comment counts. Is that a lot of work? Take into consideration the hours put into subbing one episode of a variety show. Which one takes a lot more work?
4. But I don't use my LJ as a blog! I have a Dreamwidth/Blogspot/etc! I just created an LJ account to access communities!
We understand that, and we also realize most of you have about 20-50 communities you are a part of and a number of LJ friends. You could still take the time to comment in them, especially if you've been around for a few years in LJ. Imagine someone who has been on LJ since 2007, is a part of 21 communities, has 0 journal entry and 1 comment. And that one comment is the membership comment in STORMY's LJ. That spells LEECHER to us. We know it only takes a few seconds to simply comment "thank you" to the people who have generously shared downloads/news/icons/fanworks/fics etc for your benefit.
5. But I am new on LJ!
We also understand this, and we take your joining date into consideration. We typically still prefer to give you time to contribute to other LJ communities first =)
6. What do you look out for in the answers? I don't speak good English / I am a new Arashi fan / I am not even an Arashi fan!
There is no right or wrong answer. What we look for is sincerity and honesty. We don't care how long or short your answer is, or how good or bad your English is. Some people only wrote 3-4 lines, some people wrote so long they had to comment twice. We don't care. We're not your school teachers, so there's no need to write an essay or write perfectly :) Oh, and WE DO READ all the answers.
See FAQ #7 below on what you should do if you were rejected.
7. I didn't receive an invitation after the application closes. What do I do now?
Feel free to reapply by posting another comment when membership application reopens. You can copy/paste the same comment, or write a new one entirely. It's up to you.
8. I'm an Aibakaland member and I have access to the Subbed Videos section, can I still join the LJ community? Do I need to?
Yes, you can still join, but there is no guarantee you will be accepted because we only look at your LJ profile, not your Aibakaland profile. If you already have access to the Subbed Videos section, you don't need to join the LJ community: all releases will be released at the same time with the same links, so you won't lose out on anything. (Except maybe our flailing release posts.)
9. Why did you switch to using LJ invitations from asking people to join directly?
a. We receive 20-30 applications per day and we have to find their name on the queue list one by one before choosing to accept or to reject. We found that this wasn't very efficient and took too much time, creating backlog all the time.
b. We found that LJ sometimes fails to show some names in the queue list, especially when there is downtime. Sometimes this may mean a couple hundred names in a row missing (and LJ always denies that there was a glitch.) So, this system wasn't reliable at all.
c. People kept forgetting to click Join. Or people just clicked "Join" without reading the rules or leaving a comment. The new system should get rid of this issue.
10. I received a notification that I've been invited to join the community. What do I do now?
Go to your Manage Your Invitations and choose to Accept or to Reject. Please note that LJ will automatically remove the invitation if there is no response after 30 days.
11. Why do you only open membership application for a period of time and then close it again?
We receive 20-30 applications PER DAY and ideally, we would like to process them immediately on a daily basis. However, this means spending 1-2 hours every day, and it's just not humanly possible to do this 365 days in a row, on top of our full-time school/work/both AND subbing. Subbing is our focus when this community is concerned.
12. Why was I remove as a member of this community?
You broke a rule, and yes, we've thoroughly investigated it to ensure we got the right person. In some cases, it's a rule-breaker from another community. Because we respect the efforts other people have put in sharing fanworks and because it's only about time the rule-breaker will do the same to us, we take the precaution to remove the person. In other words, one strike in the fandom, and you're out.
We believe we have answered all the questions people might have about the membership. Once again, please be reminded NOT to PM or email any of our team members or email the Stormy team sub's email regarding this, because all the answers are already here.
Thanks for your patience and understanding.
We know some of you have been asking questions and might be confused, so hopefully this FAQ we've written would be useful in answering them.
MEMBERSHIP FAQ
1. Why are you guys making it so hard for people to be a member of your community?
Read this.
2. How can I join?
Read this.
3. Why was I not accepted?
# Have you answered the two questions PROPERLY? Did you comment on the appropriate post? Do not comment anywhere else, because we wouldn't be able to find it. And don't PM/email us with your application - they will be ignored.
# Did you post in a language other than English? A few of you did this, and we're sorry, we may not be able to understand you, so please stick to English!
# Did you forget to login and post your comment as "anonymous"? Many of you actually did this. We can't approve you if we don't know who you are!
# We can't accept people using OpenID, Facebook ID, Twitter ID or Google ID because LJ can't accept them as community members. Please sign up for an LJ account and try again.
# Our home is Aibakaland where we have a minimum post/comment count requirement for members to view our subbed files. This is because we want to encourage them to be part of the community; to participate, and not just leech. Aibakaland members work hard to gain access to these files. It won't be fair if we don't do the same thing on LJ, based on your LJ post and comment counts. Is that a lot of work? Take into consideration the hours put into subbing one episode of a variety show. Which one takes a lot more work?
4. But I don't use my LJ as a blog! I have a Dreamwidth/Blogspot/etc! I just created an LJ account to access communities!
We understand that, and we also realize most of you have about 20-50 communities you are a part of and a number of LJ friends. You could still take the time to comment in them, especially if you've been around for a few years in LJ. Imagine someone who has been on LJ since 2007, is a part of 21 communities, has 0 journal entry and 1 comment. And that one comment is the membership comment in STORMY's LJ. That spells LEECHER to us. We know it only takes a few seconds to simply comment "thank you" to the people who have generously shared downloads/news/icons/fanworks/fics etc for your benefit.
5. But I am new on LJ!
We also understand this, and we take your joining date into consideration. We typically still prefer to give you time to contribute to other LJ communities first =)
6. What do you look out for in the answers? I don't speak good English / I am a new Arashi fan / I am not even an Arashi fan!
There is no right or wrong answer. What we look for is sincerity and honesty. We don't care how long or short your answer is, or how good or bad your English is. Some people only wrote 3-4 lines, some people wrote so long they had to comment twice. We don't care. We're not your school teachers, so there's no need to write an essay or write perfectly :) Oh, and WE DO READ all the answers.
See FAQ #7 below on what you should do if you were rejected.
7. I didn't receive an invitation after the application closes. What do I do now?
Feel free to reapply by posting another comment when membership application reopens. You can copy/paste the same comment, or write a new one entirely. It's up to you.
8. I'm an Aibakaland member and I have access to the Subbed Videos section, can I still join the LJ community? Do I need to?
Yes, you can still join, but there is no guarantee you will be accepted because we only look at your LJ profile, not your Aibakaland profile. If you already have access to the Subbed Videos section, you don't need to join the LJ community: all releases will be released at the same time with the same links, so you won't lose out on anything. (Except maybe our flailing release posts.)
9. Why did you switch to using LJ invitations from asking people to join directly?
a. We receive 20-30 applications per day and we have to find their name on the queue list one by one before choosing to accept or to reject. We found that this wasn't very efficient and took too much time, creating backlog all the time.
b. We found that LJ sometimes fails to show some names in the queue list, especially when there is downtime. Sometimes this may mean a couple hundred names in a row missing (and LJ always denies that there was a glitch.) So, this system wasn't reliable at all.
c. People kept forgetting to click Join. Or people just clicked "Join" without reading the rules or leaving a comment. The new system should get rid of this issue.
10. I received a notification that I've been invited to join the community. What do I do now?
Go to your Manage Your Invitations and choose to Accept or to Reject. Please note that LJ will automatically remove the invitation if there is no response after 30 days.
11. Why do you only open membership application for a period of time and then close it again?
We receive 20-30 applications PER DAY and ideally, we would like to process them immediately on a daily basis. However, this means spending 1-2 hours every day, and it's just not humanly possible to do this 365 days in a row, on top of our full-time school/work/both AND subbing. Subbing is our focus when this community is concerned.
12. Why was I remove as a member of this community?
You broke a rule, and yes, we've thoroughly investigated it to ensure we got the right person. In some cases, it's a rule-breaker from another community. Because we respect the efforts other people have put in sharing fanworks and because it's only about time the rule-breaker will do the same to us, we take the precaution to remove the person. In other words, one strike in the fandom, and you're out.
We believe we have answered all the questions people might have about the membership. Once again, please be reminded NOT to PM or email any of our team members or email the Stormy team sub's email regarding this, because all the answers are already here.
Thanks for your patience and understanding.