naanima | Livejournal - Deleting accounts + communities

Yes, Livejournal has been deleting communities and accounts.

liviapenn - Check your interests; we are being targeted. This is very informative and provides an overarching picture of what's going on.

I have gone through several hours of paranoia (I blame hormones, I friend-locked my whole el-jay, only to unlock it when the crazy left) but have gotten well over it. I'm not blaming Livejournal, I really can't when it is hammered into me on a regular basis that legal entities must avoid lawsuits at all costs. No matter how much Livejournal wants to paint themselves as friendly and open, and all about freedom of speech, they are a business; profit is the most important factor, and they cannot afford any form of bad media attention.

Honestly, the whole issue is really rather simple (on a personal el-jay level) - be smart about what you post, use common sense, and REMOVE all interests that can get you into deep shit. In fact, remove ALL of your interests. The only thing on my interest at the moment is - freedom of speech.

Irony amuses me.

ETA: A petition to Six Apart - hit them were it is important (MONEY).
- Organizing a push back
- "a petition of paid livejournal users (buying customers) who would cancel their accounts if Six Apart didn't approach this issue with more sensitivity".

Fandom is being all sorts of awesome lately.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

They aren't "targeting us," though. The WIF group is not specifically going after fandom; they're just insanely going after all journals with certain interests listed. So groups discussing Lolita by Nabokov and child abuse survivors' support communities got deleted.

Yeah, this is why I think fandoms shouldn't depend on LJ. This wouldn't have been a problem had it been a blog network, like back in the day. -_-

The whole thing really throws me - I can understand the suspension of accounts (especially the deletion of actual communities created by pedophiles), but what gets to me about the whole thing is the Nabokov community and the child abuse survivors' support community - the whole thing does not make one lick of sense. And you are right, they are not 'targeting us' (fandom), it is targeting pedophilia, which I think is a good thing, but the deletion of accounts without proper communication is an act of stupidity. Proper communication online is a huge factor, people (fans) can be insanely loyal but they can also lash back as a whole when no proper explanation nor communication has been opened. No reason for deletion, or a general reason for deletion is not something you want to do, especially when you are trying to keep your loyal customers.

Fandom, on LJ, has been completely insane as of late, and I don't think fandom should depend on LJ, mainly because I never thought of 'fandom as LJ' so much as a platform that makes communication easier. It isn't as if fandom would end just because LJ decide to delete several hundreds LJ accounts. It just means fanfic authors pick up and move to somewhere else. I remember back to the days of Yahoo groups and geocities sites. I'm perfectly fine with moving onto something new.

I think what really gets me is the timing (FanLib) and the lack of proper communication from Six Apart to their core group customer (or what use to be their core group customer). It is just a really badly handled situation that will either end badly or blow over. Either way, fandom will still exist in one way or another.

Well, from what I can see, they have to be indiscriminate because otherwise, if they have a policy of examining each case instead of doing blanket deletions upon complaint, they then are liable if they ever make a mistake when judging.

Well, it does seem, though, that unlike some other situations, there was communication. They were told why LJ did what they did. The LJ team has been communicating with the people whose accounts were deleted. It's not like the situation awhile back where some comms were just suspended without being told why.

Yeah, fandom won't end, but some people do have the mentality that fandom=LJ. Maybe LJ will give in, maybe LJ won't, but it seems to me that people should think about alternative routes.

liable if they ever make a mistake when judging.

Fair enough, though I wonder if this will effect them in other ways.

See, I think the LJ Abuse team has been doing an excellent job - they are trying to be professional and trying to do things in a way that won't inflame the manner. I'm more bemused (and slightly irritated) by the lack of communication from Six Apart. Which I suppose could just be them attempting to cover their asses in the future. Either way, the whole affair is insanely fascinating, and I'm quite curious about the outcome of this.

fandom=LJ, which makes me go 'huh', LJ is not fandom, it is just the most convenient tool that fandom has so that they may mess around with. There is Wordpress, it takes about an hour to set up (buying server space, buying URL, choosing your design), and while I'm kind of using at the moment (it is not for fandom purposes, work-related).

I don't know what Six Apart is going to say, though? If they put it on news, that's going to be the signal for more and more people to start complaining about other interests. To really solve the problem, they're going to have to change the TOS or something. They probably need to get feedback from the lawyers and stuff.

Yeah, it's a convenient tool, but when you have centralization like this, this is one example of things that can go wrong.

I think it isn't so much as changing their TOS as making it explicitly clear what is not on at LJ. That would be really useful.

Ah, but the whole point of fandom in many ways is the fact that most of us feel as if we are connected to something bigger than us. A centralised toll makes life much easier and assist us into deluding ourselves into the sense of being part of something bigger, better and greater. Also, I honestly belief that it is the convenience of a centralised meeting place/community that made LJ so popular to certain demographics. I admit - I like having several fandoms at the top of mu fingers, or maybe a lick away would be the better allegory... Um, I'm just going to stop now.

Hah, LJ has resisted doing that in the past. :P They fear that if they explicitly write it down, people are going to game the system.

Yeah, but the thing is, do you want that thing to be owned by someone else? Not saying that LJ is evil, or wrong, but ultimately they answer to their own interests and principles and liabilities, and while that is not an evil thing, sometimes it is not going to coincide with your or my interests.

And from what I have seen so far they are still resisting. It isn't as if people aren't already thinking of ways to game the system. ;P

See, I'm honestly not fussed about them owning the platform that I speak from (or the content that I store on their server) because while what I write here is important to me, I don't see it as the be all and end all of my life (or fandom). If, for some obscure reason my account does get deleted, or the content gets used without a monetary return or recognition to me I'd be annoyed but it honestly won't phase me much (mainly because I regularly back up my LJ, I am paranoid that way). Deletion of my account would piss me off on principle (and annoyance because I'd required to go and hunt all the flist down again). I'm doing what I'm doing because it is a way for me to vent, to share my interest, to be surrounded by people I find interesting, but the point is where I'm doing this from is not mine. The way I see it, I'm paying for convenience (or I paid) and nothing else, and Six Apart who is the owner has the right to pull the carpet from underneath anytime they want to.

That doesn't mean I won't kick up a fuss if they shut me down without a damn good reason. ;p

I suppose it all comes down to the issue ownership. I think I said this to you awhile back (possibly years ago) that I honestly believe that whatever you post on the internet is no longer yours, it is everyone's. And while you can be pissed and kick up a fuss, at the end of the day you are doing something for free because you love it (unless you are not doing it for free, but that's a whole other can of worms).

Gods, I'm long winded in the morning.

Oh yeah, of course it isn't a matter of life or death, but I guess what I'm seeing is just that they give themselves the right to do that, so it's always a question of whether you have faith in the management or not.

Heh, indeed.

You know what? I think this is getting to me way more than I thought it was (damn you denial, couldn't you have lasted a bit longer?). Presently, I seem to have little trust for the management of 6A, this makes me kind of angry because I gave them my trust.

Damn it.

Livejournal - Deleting accounts + communities

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