ishtar79

You know, just a month or so ago I was whining to ariadneelda about how the move away from lj seemed to have come to a standstill and people seemed mostly content with the status quo until the next big way Livejournal would find to fuck up, which should be any day.

Of course it had to happen while I was away from the Internet. My first big clue was when I was helping a friend set up an account and went “Hey, where did the Basic Account button go?”. I’m sort of caught up now, and torn between feeling disappointed to have missed it all and secretely relieved…to have missed it all.

I’ve given up on Livejournal long ago, and truly consider Insanejournal my ‘home’. Yes, I still post on lj. No apologies-I have too many friends that for various reasons I don’t see making the move. EVER. Yes, I still (depressingly) get 90% of my comments there. But trusting the site, or hoping things will improve? Forget about it. I’m seriously considering either going friends only on LJ or just mirroring RL content on Livejournal (my recs are on IJ only anyway. If I were a writer or other creative person, I’d keep my shit there too). I have a feed for my IJ already, and the time may come when I might offer it to people remotely interested in my fandom musings as an option.

In the meantime, I’ll do the very least I can, which really, considering how rarely I update, isn’t much.

ONE DAY CONTENT STRIKE For one day, Friday, March 21, make no posts. Make no comments. Let there be NO new content added to LJ. SUP obviously does not realize that Basic users have given something of value to them, that it is content that drives the site. So, for one 24-hour period, from midnight GMT to midnight GMT, let's see how many people we can get to pledge to contribute NO CONTENT. This will create a permanent downward spike in the daily-posts statistics, a permanent reminder of the power of the userbase. Full information at The Fox's Den. SPREAD THE WORD!

Btw, there are mass strikes currently happening in Greece (government to screw with pensions and the social state, big mess). I spent an hour and a half sitting in the dark (electrical company), tripping over garbage in the street (sanitation workers) and hearing our mayor warn us of the danger of plagues on TV (wish the journalist would strike, the depressing news is not helping morale). And I support those strikes 100% (though hope to avoid death by The Plague), so really, this is nothing. I’m kind of amused that I can’t escape the strikes though.

I miss discussions that aren't about Strike/Boldthrough, 6A, journaling alternatives, etc. Yes, I realise that such discussions still occur, a lot of them on my own flist, but a lot of people (including myself) can't really focus on anything else but the current drama. And while we're in this transition state, we won't get back into the swing of things-not with fics, not with meta, not with random/rl posts. I just think that's it's such a shame that a mere few weeks after the publication of DH, it almost seems like an afterthought in fandom's mind.

The unprofessional, condescending, fucking ignorant attitude of 6A/LJ staff is NOT going to change. Frankly, even if this lj_biz post was actually informative, comprehensive and used non-inflammatory language (child porn, people. As far as Our Corporate Overlords are concerned, actual images of children being abused and fictional stories/art are one and the same, and we're all en par with the Garry Glitters of the world), I still wouldn't trust them further than I could throw Hagrid.

And the fact is, we now know fanart isn't safe. Fic isn't safe. Flocked (and even private!) material isn't safe. We have no response on the subject of linking, but it wouldn't be too much of a stress to assume it isn't safe either. That last part could mean that even reccers are screwed, basically, but at this stage, I don't much care whether my own lj is safe or not. It probably is, but I am not going to stick my head in the sand while members of my flist, of my fandom disappear one by one.

And thanks to new report button, it just makes it easier for both the Moral Guardians AND fandom grudge-reporters to screw everyone over. (And don't tell me that fandom members wouldn't do that-think back to every single fannish drama, the times it's spilled over into RK, and some of the more 'colourful' personnalities we had over the years, and tell me some members of fandom are above this. With a straight face.)

I wish the various effort for leaving lj were more synchronised, though realistically, there wasn't much chance of that happening. I wish people focused more on getting the process going, and less on great plans, clever icons, endless discussions/polls/meta and nitpicking of the situations legal/social/political ramifications. Yes, planning, discussing and nitpicking is what fandom is best at, and that's why I love it, but right now it feels like I'm in the back of a bus getting away from a volcano eruption, while by co-passengers discuss whether to pick the scenic route, asking about snacks, and debating on who gets to drive.

My lj is backed up on both Greatestjournal and Insanejournal. The advantages and disadvantages of both have been discussed elsewhere, and yes, I realise they aren't a permanent solution, or ultimately 'safe'. But at this stage, they're probably safer than lj.

I've already mentioned fandom_flies, and while I think it's a great project, right now I'm impatiently watching twocorpses' efforts with Scribblit, and plan to get an account there as soon as it's past the beta stage. Yes, I realise the age requirement is an issue with many, but frankly right now it sounds like the best way to offer fandom some kind of protection against all this happening again. And it's an alternative that will be available sooner, rather than later, and that sounds a hell of a lot safer than any of the other journal clones (except possibly Journalfen, but it comes with its own set of unique issues).

Yes, none of the current alternatives offer all the technical features of LJ. But what makes this place for me isn't the comment notifications, or the embedded videos, or the customisation options-it's the people, the opinions, the community. That's what these new measures is taking away from us, and without it, all the shiny tech options in the world are absolutely worthless. LJ as we knew it may be gone, but fandom will persist, of that at least I am certain.

In case you've been living under a rock

You know, during the LJ strikethrough drama (or the first wave of the drama, if you want to be accurate), I was one of the people embracing a ‘this too shall pass’ philosophy. Partly because I don’t create fic/art, partly because I’d acquired enough distance from fandom lately, and partly because I always roll my eyes at conspiracy theories, and believed deep down that fandom would soon enough return to business as usual.

 Let the record show that I was completely and utterly  WRONG . I don’t believe this is yet another fandom drama that will blow over. In fact, I’m fairly certain that the lj fandom era as we knew it is over. And given the suspicious timing of both the ‘new improved’ TOS and the most recent journal deletions, those conspiracy theories are starting to sound a hell of a lot less far-fetched.

 I don’t care if two weeks down the line most people decide to ignore this latest slap on the face and attempt to return to business as usual-I for one can’t. As far as I’m concerned, LJ has declared war on fandom, and no amount of wishing for the best is going to stop them from coming after us again. And again.

 Of course, it’s not an open war, and that’s the only shred of insight they’ve shown since beginning this witch hunt. A significant portion of fans is just ignoring this, because after all, it only concerns those pervy underage/incest/socially unacceptable kink fans, doesn’t it? Well, to those people I say, if solidarity towards fellow fandom fans doesn’t motivate you to join in the protest, perhaps a sense of self-preservation should? It started off with ‘suspect’ interests, now it’s individual fanworks (where the age of the characters is not explicitly told/depicted, I might add), what’s to say they won’t go after your fan creations on some random basis like…oh, I don’t know, copyright violation? Your non-pervy, non-porny, non-underage het fic/art might not be as safe as you think.

 I already have accounts on all the other journaling sites (ishtar79 on both GJ and IJ, ishtar on JF), yet all the account creating seems somehow futile, because I’m very aware of the fact I have NO idea what comes next. People can’t even seem to agree whether a mass migration is warranted at all, never mind where we should migrate to. Honestly, I don’t want to move. I want LJ fandom to continue as it is. I also want a killer cleavage and a pony, but none of the above is happening. Even if we do stay here, it’ll be less our fannish playground, and more of daily looking over our shoulders, or in cases (like mine) of mere consumers, checking our flist for possible casualties.

 I just wish people’s response could somehow be…better organized. More like an actual plan, and less like mass hysteria and posting lyrics of that Pirates song that stopped being funny about a hundred comments ago.

And when I say better organized, I don’t mean striking an actual hit against 6A. This isn’t about Sticking It To The Man (though if that’s what you need to do, by all means, give it a try). This is about somehow preserving our fandom, and not ending up with little fragments scattered across the web. So, a fan-run archive (I have doubts about the feasibility of this), GJ, IJ, JF (though those of you gunning for that archive, bear in mind that a lot of people would prefer to go back to Yahoo groups than go there. See also: fandom_wank, non-robust servers), hell, the unofficial Scientology forums if you want, wherever the majority of fandom would decide to go, I’d happily follow.

 Except, I don’t think any of this will happen. No consensus on a move or the location of said move, no plan, no universal show of solidarity. Just like when people were happy to forget the last lj deletions when their friends were restored (and never mind smaller coms like riddle_torture that got shafted), I don’t think much will come out of this. It’s amazing that a single prompt in a com can produce a few hundred posts of (seemingly united) righteous indignation, and something than can possibly threaten the very community and space where we can post all those rants has us running around like directionless headless chickens. Fandom: We stand as one (except where it involves planning, putting aside petty differences, and any degree of inconvenience).

 I hope you prove me wrong, fandom, I do.