Entry tags:

flagging content system, interest ban, lj, lj politics, strikeout 07, sup

in light of this whole business, as well as strikeout 07, i have decided to leave Lj for the much better, less policed and fandom/rper-loving Gj. i can only see this entire situation getting worse, and don't want to deal with it. i disagree with the way the new flagging system was implemented, as well as the flagging system in general. i am a strong believer in the term, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

i would like to encourage anyone and everyone who finds these new implementations unfair to leave Lj and sign up with Gj. if you have not yet heard anything about these things, please read the above links, along with this/this--which list the filtering of search terms, and this, which showcases just how shitty Lj is at consistly addressing abuse reports. you can spend a lifetime following link after link, reading comment after comment, but the bottom line is, Lj has taken a turn for the worse, and i no longer want to be a part of this madness.

i understand that there are some users who are unaffected by this new system, and who don't really care. i also understand that there are many others besides myself who are affected, and who do care. even if it doesn't outright affect you, you should care. because somewhere along the line, they will implement something that will affect you, in the same manner, with the same disregard to their users' happiness.

i am urging everyone to go to another blog host, such as greatestjournal, at least until Lj loses this stupid new system. i have been happy with Lj for years, and have never had a complaint, until now. if we all moved to another host, Lj will have no choice but to get rid of the flagging system. most of Lj's users are and will be affected by this new implementation, so if we all leave, Lj will cease to make any more profit. think about it. most users have the sponsored account, which allows Lj to stick ads on their journal and userinfo. people who read these journals see these links and click on them, and buy the product being advertised, which helps the company to continue advertising on Lj, therefore making Lj a nice profit. if all or most sponsored members changed their accounts to the basic or just deleted their accounts, and went somewhere else, Lj would lose a good chunk of profit.

permanent and paid users deleting their accounts would have a similar effect. even basic users would cost Lj, because a good percent of basic users are the roleplaying journals that Lj newbies create so they can join an Lj-based game. or journals that long-time Lj users have convinced friends to start.

just think of the impact this would have on Lj, if we all left until they put things back to normal. just imagine.

i think that Gj would be more than happy to have us. Gj is 100% free. each user gets 100 free icons. yeah, so what if it's not as fancy or doesn't have as many premade layouts? at least we can still speak our minds! at least we can still post our fan fiction! at least we can still showcase our fan art! at least we can still roleplay! we can do all of this, without risk of being trolled or policed.

comment here with your new Gj username. mine is delirious19th. add me, and i will gladly add you back. if you choose to remain on Lj, that's your decision.

as for the rest of you, i'll see you on Gj, where we can continue to blog with freedom of speech!

EKB
delirious19th

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edit: because of an influx of new members, Gj has asked that all new members please join insanejournal. i don't know if Gj and Ij are in any way affiliated. apparently the sudden onset of Lj refugees has bogged the site down. who would have thought so many users would change over? :x

edit2: another thought just occurred to me. google and blogger have teamed up. you can sign up for gmail and set up blogs with blogger. i am going to go ahead and do that for now, until Gj can solve all of their server problems. right now Gj is super slow and icons are disappearing. users are also having issues making posts. so go here to create a google/blogger blog.

edit3: i've set up my blogger account, which can be found at http://delirious19th.blogspot.com/. everyone is welcome to follow!

edit3b: i forgot to mention that you can set up your blogger account through google. if you already have a gmail account, just go to google.com and click on the more dropdown link. click on blogger and sign in with your gmail account. from there you can set up your blog, and it's really quick and easy to do so. if you don't have a gmail account, that's also fairly easy. just go to gmail.com and sign up. then go back to google and follow the steps above. i don't know if they have any sort of means to create a community or friends list, but i do know that you can make multiple blogs under a single email address. i'm sure that if it comes down to it, i can just create separate blogs for my old Lj communities!

edit4: i've moved all of the most recent astrid/dante logs over to http://astridanddante.blogspot.com/. you can either read them all in the order they show up on the blog, or you can read them in chrono order from this post. i will be moving all of the older logs over there eventually; i'm just not sure if i've got it in me to keep going tonight. (:

edit4b: Ij has posted an announcement welcoming all new users, as well as reassuring everyone that a) Gj is not shutting down and b) that there is no conspiracy on either Gj's or Ij's part. (obviously referring to Lj, but in nice words.) they also thanked all of the new users for joining and said "a lot of you aren't very happy with the announcement over at our competition". Ij has low-expense paid accounts and a larger server if the need arises. again, Gj will not be shutting down. do consider Ij and blogspot for your new homes! they are both really nice communities so far. i think i might even just move over to Ij. not sure yet, but i'll let you guys know.

edit5: i've decided to create an Ij account, if anything to check it out. it seems really similar to the old style Lj. you can find me on Ij here. also, i have created a survey for those of us leaving Lj. this way we can keep in touch a lot easier. i'll compile the results and will post them here in another couple of weeks. otherwise, this will be my last update. if i find anything else of relevance, it will be added as an edit to this post. i will also continue to write on character_cafe for the time being. (i really like it, so i don't want to stop writing there even if it's still on Lj.) other than that, you can read my blogspot and i will do my best to crosspost to Gj and Ij. and, of course, there is always myspace and email.

edit6: if you're still using Lj at all, join up at ljspeaks. this is an informative community for Lj users to get together and voice their concerns about the direction that Lj has taken. the mods there stress that users are to be civil and diplomatic. it's being used as a place to gather information and to get our voices heard so that Lj can get back to normal.

if we all join this community, even if we move to other journal hosts, we can get the attention of Lj and convince them to change what they're doing! be sure to snag one of the icons on their userinfo page to show your support!

edit7: i thought this might tickle a few of you: even microsoft clip art uses keywords like christmas crackers--and we all know how bill gates can be. it just made me laugh, is all.

edit8: here is Lj's list of official Lj communities.

edit8b: i was just rereading the latest update on the flagging system, and this jumped out at me:

Based upon your feedback, the search settings for all users over the age of 18 will be set to not filter any content. This change will happen on the next code release. Please note that this is for existing journals only – new accounts will be set to Moderate Filtering, but will be able to manually change that setting.

they said next code release. i think some of us may have jumped the gun at not being able to search SPICe girls and christmas CRACKERS. i'm not very happy with any of this stuff, but i think they just haven't released that code yet. just a thought. (x-posted to ljspeaks.)

edit9: would it be possible for all of us to send brad an open letter? he mentioned that he is going to be a little more involved now that SUP has bought Lj. i mean, i don't know how much he can do, but maybe if we go about it in a diplomatic way, we can at least let him know how unhappy we are. it would at least get our voices heard by someone. and anyone from before 6A remembers, brad used to really care about the Lj community.

also, i thought i'd add that while i'm largely unhappy with the turn that things have taken here on Lj, and while i have created a blogspot, Ij and Gj, i am sticking around on Lj a bit longer. seeing that folks have gotten together at ljspeaks gives me reason to believe that maybe this isn't a lost cause. i would really like to see Lj go back to the way it was before all of this ridiculous business, but unfortunately i just don't see it happening; we've gone commercial, baby. anyway, i'm going to do my best to help out. fight until i can't fight no mo', right? i encourage everyone to join up at ljspeaks, to at least stay informed.

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update|12/12/2007 @ 7:57pm
information about Lj's 100-day plan, as well as the beginnings of an open letter to brad.

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update|12/19/2007 @ 7:47pm
i just read in innocence_jihad that a Lj user has been banned without warning and without explanation.

upon further reading, i discovered that 6A/Lj has a terrible better business bureau (BBB) track record. if you read the report, many complaints and issues have been filed against 6A, DBA Lj, but most inquiries were ignored. some were resolved. 6A is not a BBB accredited business.

the user banned from Lj, weary\ribbonundone, has filed a support ticket and still remains to receive answers. she thinks that it may have something to do with her having listed lolita as an interest; this interest had previously been banned, if i've read everything correctly.

i would like to look into filing one mass complaint at some point with the BBB. it at least logs our situation; Lj could always delete these posts, erasing proof of everything. even if 6A or SUP ignores the BBB's inquiries, at least our complaints would be logged. i don't know if now is the time to do this, or if we should wait a while, but i think it might be something to consider.

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