06:40 am: Calmer than yesterday, but...
Now that I'm not stuck in 'Oh God, I don't want to do this!' mode and researched for more than ten minutes what went on during the past couple of days and took some time to think, I'm a whole lot calmer but a bit more pissed off at the massive stupidity of people in general. Specifically, I'm pissed off at the owners of LJ and their imitation of fanfiction.net when it's being stupid. I'm also annoyed some moron who shall remain nameless who decided screaming FIRST! was an appropriate response to the apology post. I'd also like the smack that woman from the vet's office, but I'll be the first to admit that's a completely emotional response that needs to be restrained.
I started posting here because ffnet has/had (I haven't heard about any account/story deletions lately that have no real reason behind them, but I haven't exactly been active at the Pit lately) the habit of deleting people's work without checking if the complaints are valid. I wanted to be surprised LJ did the same, and I guess I was a tiny bit, but I'm really not. People do rash things when their income is threatened, and a group of morons threatened LJ's source of income.
I'm a realist most of the time. I'd like to think my refusal to renew my paid account would have an impact. Realistically, I don't think it would. I'm one person among millions. A number of people are completely moving to other sites; I'm tempted to move to another site. But I don't think it's going to be enough to make LJ realize how badly they screwed up, as they now have advertisers to back up our money. They mess up again and more people leave, then they might have some idea.
Free speech is important, but it ends when one person threatens another, whether they're an adult or a child. LJ attempted to curtail some of the more dangerous people using their site. I commend them for that. However, the way they went about it was extremely irresponsible. Not only did they suspend/delete many innocent people's accounts/communities, they let the predators know what not to put in their profiles and to friend-lock their journals so others who stumble across them don't have the information they need to report them to LJ admin and/or the police. For that, LJ's owners won the second place spot in the Darwin Dumbass Awards, internet only version. First place is a tie between the morons who started this whole thing and the creators of FanLib. LJ's owners also made the mistake of going to the media before us, but in the grand scheme of things that mistake is minor compared to the other, much bigger one.
With all that said, I am, for the moment, sticking around while posting at other sites as well. I'm still going to use this site and post here, but I've also started journals at other sites to test them out and see which one I like best in case something like this happens again. I may or may not renew my account here. I find the ads annoying, but I'm also comfortable here. Right now, it all depends on LJ's ability to learn from their mistakes and their ability to remember to research is necessary, so the next time a group of nutcases come along LJ knows better than to react from the gut.
Other journals:
http://nightseer.insanejournal.com/profile
http://www.greatestjournal.com/userinfo.bml?user=brennanight
ETA: http://news.livejournal.com/98733.html?thread=47214509#t47214509 Frickin' Hilarious. Not for kiddies 'cause it's porny. Someone was gonna do it eventually, I'm just glad I saw it. I needed a laugh.
Tags: lj ranting,
rl
cranky