Sigh....

[shadowkat]

Color me stupid or more appropriately too lazy to figure it out - but why are people on my flist doing a content boycott of live journal on March 21st GMT (is that Grande Mountain Time?) from midnight to midnight?

So, what have they done or are threatening to do to everyone, now? And more to the point, do I really want to know? Headache inducing trauma, I can do without.

Uggy, frustrating week. But back is better. Looking forward to the three day weekend - yes, my workplace is odd, we get Good Friday off. I have no idea why. Never had this before. I'm not celebrating it or Easter, because I'm not religious for reasons I won't irritate you with.

Planning to lay back, watch the telly, read, straighten, eat, and maybe hang with a friend. Had planned to visit kid-bro, but he hasn't gotten back to me and I don't want to risk throwing my back out this weekend trying to climb in and out of the loft that doubles as a guest-room. I can do that next weekend.

Why is it that the universe gives you hope one day, then pulls it away from you the next? (Obama speech is a great example - yesterday the media was going on about how wonderful it was, and important. Tonight they are stating how Obama is now un-electable from a Republican standpoint. Sigh. I won't depress anyone with why. I know why. It's stupid and I'd rather not think about it. Suffice it to say, my father was right the people who needed to hear what was said in that speech, dismissed it as mere rhetoric and didn't learn a thing. Makes me want to kick people just thinking about it.). Anyhow..all of this just Makes life feel a bit like a see-saw or rather doing the texas two-step. I've decided I can't predict let along control what is going to happen next nor worry about it any more, so am going to continue focusing hard on enjoying the moment and letting the future take care of itself. It's bound to do that anyways without much help from me.

Comments

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

It's because of the end to the creation of ad-free Basic Accounts, and also a really pathetic row about potentially controversial interests being removed from a list of "most popular interests" that LJ put up as a PR thing (they've now been returned).

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Ah. Thanks!

Well, I guess I should be upset about the end of the ad-free basic accounts, since that is how I started. But...it is a business. Making money off the internet is a whole lot harder and a lot more complicated than people think. So glad I'm out of that business now.

Again on the interests thing? This keeps coming up. I'm wondering if they are reacting to the bad press that MySpace and Facebook got. And attempting to attract customers from those services by showing they don't permit that sort of stuff? Would make sense. MySpace and Facebook sold for millions, making their owners set for life. If LJ can find a way to get a piece of that action - I can see them going for it. Really hope they don't, I hate MySpace and Facebook. Tried both, horrid interfaces (not sure that's the right word).

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

I've joined both MySpace and Facebook and I don't like them either... for some reason lj is just more conducive to writing, which is mostly what I want a journal for. I've had a paid account here because I wanted a ton of icons, and I like putting up lots of photos....

I do think they are making a mistake in getting rid of the basic accounts, since there are new people who would have kept this thing lively who will now never come to lj, and will go elsewhere instead. New people who would have eventually opened paid accounts....

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Agreed. Both MySpace and FaceBook cater to a different audience - one who doesn't want to write - so much as post vids, photos and quick notes to each other and play with computer stuff. They aren't set up for writers like myself, who have little patience for programming language, don't care about vids, and just want to write and read personal essays, stories, articles, and letters. Sort of the difference between folks who subscribe to People Magazine or Variety and those who subscribe to Science Fiction and Fantasy Quarterly and the New Yorker.

Totally different crowds. I find MySpace and FaceBook a tad irritating - there's a lot demeaning porn on it and whores selling their wares to members - I know, half the people attempting to friend me were whores that I had to ban or kick off as spam. The prostitute who slept with Eliot Spitzer has a site on MySpace and has made millions selling her songs on it for example. This why people keep screaming about the net being unsafe for kids and why MySpace and Facebook have garnered so much press. It's also why LJ keeps doing what it's doing - it is trying to sell itself as a safe haven, a porn-free zone, which it pretty much is, unless you count fanfiction - which I don't. Very different. But I can see why LJ is struggling with that from a PR perspective. A bit hard to sell yourself as porn-free, when you've got people writing erotic fanfic about Harry Potter and Snape doing the nasty or listing interests such as Snape/Potter slash, or potterporn. LOL! By the same token, you can't really delete these folks, since that would be censorship and they aren't really doing anything wrong. The owners in a quandry. What you can do is insist people tag it and hide it in locked posts - which does distinguish you from MySpace - I don't think you can lock things on MySpace.

Getting rid of basic, makes sense from a biz perspective, but not from a marketing one. You're right - you are eliminating potential customers. Most people want to try you out first and half the members are people who current members brought aboard. What you should do is permit them to open a basic account for about a year then state that by the end of that year they have the option to either have one with ads or a paid account without ads - call a trial period. Although I really don't understand why they feel the need to get rid of them - if it's only 10% of the members anyway. People will upgrade once they realize how limited they are.

On the plus side - getting rid of basic accounts does get rid of some of the trolls - the folks who set up dummy accounts to bug the rest of us. OTOH - those people probably would do it anyways - since I can't imagine ads bugging them that much.

I'm just glad I'm not in this business. It's headache inducing.

By the way - I love your icons. Particularly the one above.