"Either you have a grassroots social network where fans can do whatever they want that will always struggle due to lack of corporate sponsorship dollars, or you have a large and stable social network funded by corporate dollars that has to restrict some content in order to get the money to run well."
Wrong. LJ WAS something close to a grassroots thingy. It did not have to pursue commercially the goal fo becoming the most bloated thing ever, and it did not have to decide that it survival was more important than the continued wellbeing and happy being fot he members that made it what it is. Funded by corporate dollars? yes, why? because these corporate dollars wanted access to my fucking eyeballs. my continued attentive presence. and/or by paid-account money. Well, they won't get none of it anymore.
I am not surprised. I am not hysterical. I am also not amused, don't find it pleasant, don't want to put my trust or money into an organisation that behaves like this. that is all.
It did not have to pursue commercially the goal fo becoming the most bloated thing ever, and it did not have to decide that it survival was more important than the continued wellbeing and happy being fot he members that made it what it is.
There's nothing inherently evil in choosing to operate for profit. (And obviously I don't think LJ would agree that their goal was to become "the most bloated thing ever." I suspect their goal was more like "become a centralized social networking hub," which they've certainly succeeded at. To me they're a bit like Microsoft Word now: cumbersome, with some frustrations, but such an industry standard you can't go without it.)
don't want to put my trust or money into an organisation that behaves like this.As it is LJ's prerogative to be an organization like this, so it is your prerogative to choose to exit it. Like I said, though, I don't think they're behaving all that strangely, and I really don't think you're going to find a place that can give you LJ's consistent uptime with JF's post-
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I suspect their goal was more like "become a centralized social networking hub,"
Nah. Their goal was to turn a profit. They don't give a damn about being a centralized social networking hub except insofar as it can make them money. Which, cool, whatever. But they're not getting any more of my money. Of course they have the right to run their site however they see fit, but I think the way they're doing it is confusing and hamfisted. I'm not interested in giving money to a site that will delete a user's entire journal because one right-wing nutjob points to one post that violates the fuzzy definitions in the TOS. They could give a warning, they could delete the post, they could insist the user make it private - there are a dozen ways they could handle it that don't include deleting years worth of posts. That's just bullshit, and seriously bad customer service.
Okay, their goal was "become a centralized social networking hub for profit." I should've been clearer. I didn't think they were trying to become a centralized social networking hub for the betterment of society, alas.
hey could give a warning, they could delete the post, they could insist the user make it privateI don't know about deleting the post, but it's my understanding that the other two options leave LJ open to severe liability. Quoting myself from another reply
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First of all, may I say I am with you on the comparisons of anything with the Holocaust? Twelve million people were killed. Stop comparing every little slight to it, people! (A hugh pet peeve of mine
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I agree that it's not being handled well. Certainly I don't find LJ any great paragon of appropriate behavior. As I've said elsewhere, though, I think they're scared and trying to cover their asses, and everybody's confused from users on up to owners. A bad situation with bad choices. Not a holocaust
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Just playing devil's advocate here, because I like the discussion:
Hi, we found images depicting minors in sexual situations on your blog.The problem I have is that it's not clear that that is the situation here
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iirc it was on a comm where that could rationally be assumed.
(a non-existent human being)
In an age where nude statues are getting covered up or edited out of films, this doesn't protect anything.
the younger man could easily be 18
And could just as easily not be 18.
It portrays a clearly consensual situation.
Irrelevant when it comes to statutory rape.
If the younger man did not resemble the 18 yo actor Daniel Radcliffe, would the LJ have been deleted without warning?
Probably not. Like I said in my other comment, I'd have assumed if it depicted Harry that it was underage Harry.
I question the wisdom of their actions, including from a profit-making standpoint. I would bet that fandom affilliated LJs have a profoundly higher rate of paid LJs than non-fandom LJs.I suspect that when LJ is weighing the cost of losing paid members vs. the cost of losing sponsors or being investigated by Dateline or the feds, losing membership is the cheaper
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I find the latest LJ bannings frustrating and irritating, and I really really hate the new de-linking of usernames when they've been deleted/suspended, but really, I'm with you. It's all very annoying, but it isn't the end of the world. We'll cope.
There's also nothing better out there than LJ for our purposes, which is why I think that -- no matter how much hysteria we see -- everyone will end up staying put. If and when the fanarchive project is up and running, maybe we'll go for that... but I don't see anything satisfying fans until and unless we made something of our own. (And even then people will complain that it's not X, Y, or Z, or that it's advertiser-supported or something.)
I think there's a certain way these things go hand in hand, though. I think it's more likely that something fan-run will be somebody's baby, and they'll want to cling to control of said baby at the risk of losing features.
I think the fact that there is no better site than LJ and that the fan-run archive hasn't gelled into place yet is pretty telling evidence that it ain't so easy to do the grassroots thing as we would all like to believe.
we really don't have anything to compare it to right now.
I think that's telling, though. Why aren't there other fan-run social networks to compare it to? That seems to imply that it's damn hard to get them up and running.
I looked at the picture Ponderosa posted and nowhere did it say Harry was over 18 in the picture. Looking at him, it was just as possible he was underage as not - he could have been anywhere from age 15 up, judging just as someone who saw the picture on its own. With Harry Potter fanworks, people not in the fandom tend to assume the worst anyway. You could be writing HP gen where they're doing nothing more than riding unicorns in the Forbidden Forest, but someone will hear "I write Harry Potter fiction" as "I write stories about kids having sex
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Comments 23
Wrong. LJ WAS something close to a grassroots thingy. It did not have to pursue commercially the goal fo becoming the most bloated thing ever, and it did not have to decide that it survival was more important than the continued wellbeing and happy being fot he members that made it what it is. Funded by corporate dollars? yes, why? because these corporate dollars wanted access to my fucking eyeballs. my continued attentive presence. and/or by paid-account money. Well, they won't get none of it anymore.
I am not surprised. I am not hysterical. I am also not amused, don't find it pleasant, don't want to put my trust or money into an organisation that behaves like this. that is all.
Reply
There's nothing inherently evil in choosing to operate for profit. (And obviously I don't think LJ would agree that their goal was to become "the most bloated thing ever." I suspect their goal was more like "become a centralized social networking hub," which they've certainly succeeded at. To me they're a bit like Microsoft Word now: cumbersome, with some frustrations, but such an industry standard you can't go without it.)
don't want to put my trust or money into an organisation that behaves like this.As it is LJ's prerogative to be an organization like this, so it is your prerogative to choose to exit it. Like I said, though, I don't think they're behaving all that strangely, and I really don't think you're going to find a place that can give you LJ's consistent uptime with JF's post- ( ... )
Reply
Nah. Their goal was to turn a profit. They don't give a damn about being a centralized social networking hub except insofar as it can make them money. Which, cool, whatever. But they're not getting any more of my money. Of course they have the right to run their site however they see fit, but I think the way they're doing it is confusing and hamfisted. I'm not interested in giving money to a site that will delete a user's entire journal because one right-wing nutjob points to one post that violates the fuzzy definitions in the TOS. They could give a warning, they could delete the post, they could insist the user make it private - there are a dozen ways they could handle it that don't include deleting years worth of posts. That's just bullshit, and seriously bad customer service.
Reply
Okay, their goal was "become a centralized social networking hub for profit." I should've been clearer. I didn't think they were trying to become a centralized social networking hub for the betterment of society, alas.
hey could give a warning, they could delete the post, they could insist the user make it privateI don't know about deleting the post, but it's my understanding that the other two options leave LJ open to severe liability. Quoting myself from another reply ( ... )
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Hi, we found images depicting minors in sexual situations on your blog.The problem I have is that it's not clear that that is the situation here ( ... )
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Why assume that is Harry Potter
iirc it was on a comm where that could rationally be assumed.
(a non-existent human being)
In an age where nude statues are getting covered up or edited out of films, this doesn't protect anything.
the younger man could easily be 18
And could just as easily not be 18.
It portrays a clearly consensual situation.
Irrelevant when it comes to statutory rape.
If the younger man did not resemble the 18 yo actor Daniel Radcliffe, would the LJ have been deleted without warning?
Probably not. Like I said in my other comment, I'd have assumed if it depicted Harry that it was underage Harry.
I question the wisdom of their actions, including from a profit-making standpoint. I would bet that fandom affilliated LJs have a profoundly higher rate of paid LJs than non-fandom LJs.I suspect that when LJ is weighing the cost of losing paid members vs. the cost of losing sponsors or being investigated by Dateline or the feds, losing membership is the cheaper ( ... )
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There's also nothing better out there than LJ for our purposes, which is why I think that -- no matter how much hysteria we see -- everyone will end up staying put. If and when the fanarchive project is up and running, maybe we'll go for that... but I don't see anything satisfying fans until and unless we made something of our own. (And even then people will complain that it's not X, Y, or Z, or that it's advertiser-supported or something.)
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Frustrating, absolutely, I agree. Surprising, no. Evil, certainly not. A sign of our times, hell yeah.
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As helens78 said in another comment:
I think the fact that there is no better site than LJ and that the fan-run archive hasn't gelled into place yet is pretty telling evidence that it ain't so easy to do the grassroots thing as we would all like to believe.
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(The comment has been removed)
I think that's telling, though. Why aren't there other fan-run social networks to compare it to? That seems to imply that it's damn hard to get them up and running.
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