It's LJ-drama again, surprise, surprise

[rodo]

Okay, so I read a bit about the recent LJ-drama, and I'm only mildly interested in it, but I noticed something about myself while I kept reading some of the comments to the news posts: The more people complain, the less I care about their concerns.

I think that the reason for this is probably that it feels much like a deja-vu:


1. LJ does something tremendously stupid. check
2. People complain about it. check
3. LJ says they're sorry. check
4. People keep complaining and threaten to leave. check
5. LJ doesn't change the policy in question. check
6. People stay (and pay) anyway. check

Sounds familiar? I certainly hope so. I was very much invested in all this back in May and June, and whenever LJ did something stupid, I was complaining about it, posting like mad and I could not shut up about in RL either. The first time (Strikethrough), I believed them and renewed my paid account. The second time I stopped paying and went back to basic, after that I cross-posted to IJ and after that I decided to make IJ my main journal. The way this is going it's only a matter of time until I finally delete my journal. And I will do that, once I don't care about losing my LJ-flist anymore, which won't take all that long. I hardly read it anyway nowadays, and I only use my journal to post comments in communities that don't allow outsiders to read entries or post comments. And really, I can live without my flist. And I can live without LJ. What I could not live with was being a hypocrite and not go through with the threats I made in the comments of the news posts.

And this is probably why I don't sympathise with the LJ users at the moment. Every time I read sentences like "I just renewed my paid account because I believed you last time" or "You have to work on your communication skills!" I just want to tell the poster to shut up already because LJ proved that they won't do that. The complaining won't do any good. Neither will the spamming. The only thing that might make them change their minds is people going through with their threats.

This whole situation kind of reminds me of the wife who won't leave her abusive husband (minus the beating and psychological abuse). The users won't leave LJ, no matter what (I'm quite sure I saw an icon like that somewhere). And the longer this is going on, the less sorry I feel for them. Maybe in half a year or so I'll even think of their behaviour as amusing. I guess this means that I really spent too much time on the internet.

And since I don't think the drama is too entertaining at the moment I'll just continue to look for a long, plot-driven, post-season 2 Dark Angel fic (gen) that doesn't make me want to scream after the first two paragraphs for some reason or another. I haven't found anything yet, but who knows? It's better for my blood pressure than losing my temper over internet drama anyway.

Comments

[yonmei.insanejournal.com]

The first time (Strikethrough)

The second time (http://stewardess.insanejournal.com/227815.html?format=light).

Strikethrough 2007 was deja vu..

[yonmei.insanejournal.com]

Not that I don't agree with everything in the rest of your post.

[rood.insanejournal.com]

I know that now (found out during Boldthrough), which is why I clarified "first time". After all, that was way back when I was still innocent and gullible.

[dragovianknight.insanejournal.com]

I think I said something very much like this the last time LJ drama happened. LJ users don't learn from the past, apparently.

[rood.insanejournal.com]

LJ users don't learn from the past, apparently.

I wonder what this says about the general intelligence of internet users.

[blnchflr]

I can understand users finding it hard to leave, if nobody else from their f-list is leaving - I certainly wouldn't have been able to stop posting at IJ if it wasn't for having an active f-list here. But I still haven't stopped reading - still too many people sticking with LJ that I'm not quite ready to give up on.

What does sadden me is seeing people who were outraged, and stopped paying LJ, some of them moving their main blogging here, start regretting and going back to LJ, saying they might as well pay LJ, so they can have icons and polls. Yeah, it disappoints me.

[rood.insanejournal.com]

What does sadden me is seeing people who were outraged, and stopped paying LJ, some of them moving their main blogging here, start regretting and going back to LJ, saying they might as well pay LJ, so they can have icons and polls. Yeah, it disappoints me.

There are people like that? That's really disappointing. Especially since IJ is almost like LJ, only with fewer people. But I quite like that, because the whole atmosphere here is so friendly.

*sneaks in*

[eumelkeks.insanejournal.com]

You are so right. And then there is the huge majority of people who just doesn't care. I keep telling my flist over at LJ that things are bad, that LJ is not a happy place anymore, even if you are not a paedophile fanfiction writer. A few of them were mildly annoyed by the latest debacle and posted a comment in LJ news. I persuaded some of them to get an IJ. But will they move or stop paying for their LJ account? No. =(

Incidentally, do you mind if I friend you?

Re: *sneaks in*

[rood.insanejournal.com]

I keep telling my friends too, but they are all a bit lazy.

And no, I don't mind having you as a friends.

Re: *sneaks in*

[eumelkeks.insanejournal.com]

Excellent. Being German, writing fanfic and sharing a few of your fandoms, I figured we have enough in common. :D

[sevilemar.insanejournal.com]

Here I am!

OK, it took me a while, but after seeing the new LJ-drama I finally had enough. It's like you said, I probably will delete my LJ if I can persuade the mods of LöschDich! to come over to IJ too.

[duskpeterson.insanejournal.com]

You know, one way to retain at least some of your LJ Friends is simply to have someone with a paid account at LJ start a syndicated feed for your IJ blog, like this (http://syndicated.livejournal.com/duskpeterson_ij/profile). Then your posts will continue to show up on their Friends pages.