I Didn't Want To Do This ...

[andraste]

Look, I know there are plenty of people following my livejournal who have no interest in Dreamwidth for whatever reason. I know that there are plenty of people, including several I hang out with in RL, who don't want to go to another site to comment on my posts. I know that my comment count will drop if I make everyone go to Dreamwidth to respond. Even so, I have decided that I need to redirect comments to Dreamwidth. It sucks, but there it is.

Livejournal's latest bit of 'crosspost your comments to other sites!' idiocy is the last straw for me. It's not that I think anyone on my flist is going to be stupid enough to crosspost comments on my locked posts to their Twitter or Facebook accounts. I just think it's mindbogglingly stupid that people now have tickyboxes for that purpose. Tickyboxes that you need a Greasemonkey script to turn off if you don't want to look at them every time you leave a comment on lj. (And, sure, there's nothing to stop people copying and pasting the text of their comment on my journal, or my entire journal entry, to anywhere they like. That's no reason to have a feature that ENCOURAGES this behaviour. Not to mention potentially allowing it to occur by accident.)

I have had a paid Dreamwidth account for over a year now, and their customer service has been excellent. The site works and does not make my eyes bleed if I look at it on a computer that does not have adblocker installed. (Since I often check in from university computers, that is known to happen with livejournal.) If anyone wants an invite code for a free account, let me know. You can comment on my Dreamwidth journal with OpenID and I also allow anonymous commenting if you don't feel like logging in at all. (Please do leave a name, though!)

I'm not leaving livejournal- there are too many interesting people and communities there - but I am increasingly aware that they have no interest whatsoever in keeping me around.

ETA: For anyone who only just heard about this and wonders what the hell I'm on about, the news post and its many, many pages of unhappy comments are here.

Comments

[saltedpin.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm waiting to see if they make an announcement about it, but short of 'we will remove this egregious piece of fuckery', I will be moving to Dreamwidth in the near future.

[andraste]

I am amused that the post has hundreds and hundreds of comments that are just 'WTF IS THIS?!' over and over. Occasionally they're interspersed with 'oooo, I want a kitty!' but nobody at all seems to be in favour of the ridiculous cross-posting.

On the bright side, Dreamwidth is nice and comfy.

[weewarrior]

Is this connected to the weird banner that popped up this morning when I opened lj? "PingBacks" they called it? They made it appear that it is possible to turn that off in your settings.

[andraste]

That's a separate feature - one I have no quarrel with since it's opt-out and pays attention to privacy settings.

[weewarrior]

I don't want to bother you, but it's really the first I hear about this crossposting thing. Was there an announcement?

[andraste]

It's no bother! I should have put a link up before; the announcement only happened today and I'm sure plenty of people don't follow the news comm.

[weewarrior]

Thanks so much!

[takhys]

Howdy howdy, I've got your journal friended over on LJ and it's looking more and more likely that I'm moving over to DW. So, I hope you don't mind, but I've friended you here as well.

[andraste]

Howdy howdy, I've got your journal friended over on LJ and it's looking more and more likely that I'm moving over to DW. So, I hope you don't mind, but I've friended you here as well.

Not at all! (I will probably remove you from my flist over at livejournal if you're cross-posting; I'm trying to avoid duplications.)

[johnnash]

In anticipation, I joined Dreamwidth and I used one of your codes, and I friended you here as well.

Grr. I'm too tired to be coherent. But grr.

[andraste]

In anticipation, I joined Dreamwidth and I used one of your codes, and I friended you here as well.

Happy to have you aboard!

Grr. I'm too tired to be coherent. But grr.

I second your 'grr' and raise you an 'argh'. Even if they do turn it off at this point - and they don't seem to be in any great hurry, even given the 100+ pages of DO NOT WANT comments - the whole idea of livejournal being in bed with Facebook is something I find icky.

[johnnash]

Thanks for the warm welcome!

It's very icky. And so are a lot of Internet alliances that have been made between networking sites and/or corporations. And eroding Net Neutrality. The whole thing begins to worry the pants off me.

[andraste]

It's very icky. And so are a lot of Internet alliances that have been made between networking sites and/or corporations. And eroding Net Neutrality. The whole thing begins to worry the pants off me.

Apparently livejournal are pursuing greater integration with Facebook, which, eeeeew. Facebook is one big pile of DO NOT WANT as far as I'm concerned.

[lizvogel]

And my first, entirely selfish response is "Oh good, now I have an excuse to read you exclusively on Dreamwidth, and eliminate another duplicate on LJ!"

One does wonder what profit LJ thinks they're going to make from this latest, er, feature.

[andraste]

And my first, entirely selfish response is "Oh good, now I have an excuse to read you exclusively on Dreamwidth, and eliminate another duplicate on LJ!"

Yeah, I am working on taking the people I am following here off my list at livejournal. I get confused about how many people I know on the internet otherwise!

One does wonder what profit LJ thinks they're going to make from this latest, er, feature.

Apparently they are pursuing greater integration with Facebook, so my guess is that the lure of all those potential users far outweighs the overwhelming displeasure of their existing base.