For most of 2009, I've had the strong impression that there are fewer good conversations to be found on livejournal than there used to be. Is that your impression as well? And if it is, what do you attribute that to?
I had a friend say that she preferred Facebook because it tended to brief remarks and photos rather than introspection; I noted that I prefer LJ, precisely because of that about Facebook.
I suppose you're right, but I suspect that like many other people I just haven't had much time for LJ in recent months. (Also, I was thinking of you as I was driving home, and wanting to ask you a TV question. But I won't do it here unless that's OK with you, since I don't want to potentially derail your discussion.)
I haven't had that experience. I am not sure, though, what kind of conversations you're looking for. The conversations I enjoy on other people's journals are most often very personal even though they have broader implications. Several of my friends have those conversations often. The other conversations I find valuable (though I do not enjoy them) are those about racism or sexism. And there have been bevies of those conversations in which I have sometimes been quietly involved.
You always enjoyed conversations about narratives and things like that. Perhaps your livejournal friends have moved away from that and those conversations are happening in another part of the internet?
That's a very good question. I suppose I'm looking for conversations about things that matter to me or to my friends, or both, and which I can have analytical or amusing or multilayered conversations about with people I care about.
I guess a lot of what I'm saying is that the people I care about aren't talking much about things that matter to them, and they're also not diving in to talk about the things that matter to me, either. So I'm asking this question to find out whether other people in other parts of livejournal are experiencing the same thing, or if it's totally different elsewhere.
That being the case then no I have definitely not experienced this.
Of the last 20 posts on my friends page 5 have invoked comment beyond "good one" from me. I guess you'll probably be aware that two of those posts are yours ;) but still. I get about 3 - 4 pages a day so that's almost 20 conversations about things people care about.
My posts tend not to inspire conversation exactly... though if I were reading them they would because I care about the same things as me...
And comments are great! Especially yours, because you always have interesting observations. :-) But really I'm talking about more in-depth conversations, where lots of people chime in and people interact with each other and not just with me. And where they write reams and reams in layered levels of comments about their own point of view, and not just respond to what I said and leave it at that. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know, this conversation. Or this one, or this one.
I'm both trying to overcome a reputation for online muckraking, years ago, and also have had people pasting my LJ posts out-of-context into email sent to my management at work, trying to get me in trouble. So over the past couple of years I've shied away from provocative issues or sharing deeper issues...
While I second rosefox's comment about excellent conversations on anti-racism and anti-sexism, I also think that Racefail (which astonishingly hasn't been mentioned yet in this thread) drove a lot of people away, or at least silent.
Managing DW/LJ is work. People are being seduced by Facebook and Twitter, though I can't imagine why. Some of my favorite posters put up pictures and to-do lists and not conversational posts.
And I do still see/participate in more than enough to keep me involved.
Racefail only barely grazed most of the parts of livejournal I frequent, actually, so that's probably why you haven't seen it mentioned in my journal. (There are quite a few people reading this who won't even know what you mean by that, in fact. Hard to imagine, I know! :-)
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-J
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You always enjoyed conversations about narratives and things like that. Perhaps your livejournal friends have moved away from that and those conversations are happening in another part of the internet?
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I guess a lot of what I'm saying is that the people I care about aren't talking much about things that matter to them, and they're also not diving in to talk about the things that matter to me, either. So I'm asking this question to find out whether other people in other parts of livejournal are experiencing the same thing, or if it's totally different elsewhere.
-J
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Of the last 20 posts on my friends page 5 have invoked comment beyond "good one" from me. I guess you'll probably be aware that two of those posts are yours ;) but still. I get about 3 - 4 pages a day so that's almost 20 conversations about things people care about.
My posts tend not to inspire conversation exactly... though if I were reading them they would because I care about the same things as me...
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-J
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Managing DW/LJ is work. People are being seduced by Facebook and Twitter, though I can't imagine why. Some of my favorite posters put up pictures and to-do lists and not conversational posts.
And I do still see/participate in more than enough to keep me involved.
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-J
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