I think a lot of people have moved; I’m not certain it can be entirely ascribed to DDoS attacks, though. There’s a lot less activity on LJ then there once was. I see a lot of people on twitter, when I check twitter.
For my part, I post a lot less not because I dislike LJ or the community, but because the posts took - and take - a lot of time, and I am criminally behind in everything (which of course is down to my inability to organize well T_T).
Twitter is like a water cooler at an office - it’s snippets and streams of conversation.
And sometimes I get self-conscious. I post writer-related things maybe once a month on my actual web-site - but I’m almost afraid to drive readers away if I post too much, because a lot of readers don’t actually care about anything but the books (and this is fine; as a reader, I care about the books so if I’m checking out an author’s web-site, I’m looking for release dates or new sales).
Of the people that were formerly on my friends list who have since deleted accounts or gone inactive*, I'd say that about 3/4 of them had indicated that they moved to Facebook instead of deal with LJ's issues with DDoS attacks.
Your description of Twitter is good, but I think if you added "talking into a bullhorn" to it, that'd be pretty much spot on. I still resist moving to Twitter, mainly due to its raw unfiltered quality. That unnerves me, particularly due to my career in IT.
I guess I'm in the minority because I like to hear non-book related snippets, because they make a person real to me. Since we're not going to sit down and talk over coffee for a couple of hours, this is a great way to get to know someone over distance, and blogging moves more in the direction of thoughtful conversation than the meme-oriented blurbs on Facebook.
*As in "no posts for over a year" type of inactive, not the infrequently posts but is still around sort.
My LJ posting went down because I felt I might lose my job as I watched the attacks amongst the SF/F group escalate. The discussions seemed to turn into Jerry Springer, and I got turned off.
And facebook and google are so much easier for the majority, that people flock to them. It's far easier to just click on 'share' than to actually comment, even a simple statement, about a situation. And LJ doesn't make it easy to share sites or images amongst one another. It's far easier to put up a meme than to actually express how you feel about a situation, and less dangerous.
I know I heard this one lady disparage LJ as nothing more than people reporting about their lunch, which used to be what people said about twitter. She went on about how tumblr was so great because it was mainly images. That makes me think, sadly, that people would rather pictures and slogans which fit on an image like a commercial jingle rather than a discussion. This makes me sad, because I love discussions.
If LJ were more user friendly in terms of cross posting --and configuration in general-- I'd think that some people would use it more. LJ is more restrictive than Blogger, which is saying quite a bit. I don't think they need to go the Wordpress route, but having a setup that will handle links and other items more easily would be nice.
Of course, FB is so walled in that you can't really share anything from a FB link, even if you've got an account there, because you'd have to set the link to "open" internally to FB.
"I know I heard this one lady disparage LJ as nothing more than people reporting about their lunch,"
I chuckled about this description, considering the number of people who use FB and Twitter for the exact same thing. And since Tumblr is all images, people will simply post lunch pics instead of actually saying what they ate.
What I miss are the long, thoughtful discussions on LJ of several years ago. Now we're reduced to shouted comments on FB and Twitter.
I think it's just that blogging's time in the sun is over in general and it's more of a niche activity now. Most of my friends on LJ are gone too, but they haven't moved on to write anywhere else... instead they post two-sentence status updates on Facebook every so often or share memes on Tumblr, neither of which appeal to me - but sadly, writing in bigger chunks doesn't seem to come naturally to most people.
Yes, the ease of use of FB has really killed off the "blog about your meal" folks. LJ is one of the most restrictive blogging platforms out there, however, and when the DDoS attacks started up I began to hear people complain about why stick with LJ and it's restrictions when I could use Blogger or Wordpress and have more options for free. Or just go to Dreamwidth not have to deal with DDoS attacks at all.
And when some people left, they weren't replaced by others, and so I've seen a downward spiral in activity and new accounts.
However, I guess if I want activity, it has to start with me. I have to be more active on LJ too.
I think the majority moved to FB. A few moved to Dreamwidth, with is LJ without the Russian ownership or excessive restrictions part, and a few others moved to G+. I haven't seen as many of my friends talk about Tumblr, so I think FB still got the lion's share of people.
And some just drifted away from social media in general.
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For my part, I post a lot less not because I dislike LJ or the community, but because the posts took - and take - a lot of time, and I am criminally behind in everything (which of course is down to my inability to organize well T_T).
Twitter is like a water cooler at an office - it’s snippets and streams of conversation.
And sometimes I get self-conscious. I post writer-related things maybe once a month on my actual web-site - but I’m almost afraid to drive readers away if I post too much, because a lot of readers don’t actually care about anything but the books (and this is fine; as a reader, I care about the books so if I’m checking out an author’s web-site, I’m looking for release dates or new sales).
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Your description of Twitter is good, but I think if you added "talking into a bullhorn" to it, that'd be pretty much spot on. I still resist moving to Twitter, mainly due to its raw unfiltered quality. That unnerves me, particularly due to my career in IT.
I guess I'm in the minority because I like to hear non-book related snippets, because they make a person real to me. Since we're not going to sit down and talk over coffee for a couple of hours, this is a great way to get to know someone over distance, and blogging moves more in the direction of thoughtful conversation than the meme-oriented blurbs on Facebook.
*As in "no posts for over a year" type of inactive, not the infrequently posts but is still around sort.
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And facebook and google are so much easier for the majority, that people flock to them. It's far easier to just click on 'share' than to actually comment, even a simple statement, about a situation. And LJ doesn't make it easy to share sites or images amongst one another. It's far easier to put up a meme than to actually express how you feel about a situation, and less dangerous.
I know I heard this one lady disparage LJ as nothing more than people reporting about their lunch, which used to be what people said about twitter. She went on about how tumblr was so great because it was mainly images. That makes me think, sadly, that people would rather pictures and slogans which fit on an image like a commercial jingle rather than a discussion. This makes me sad, because I love discussions.
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Of course, FB is so walled in that you can't really share anything from a FB link, even if you've got an account there, because you'd have to set the link to "open" internally to FB.
"I know I heard this one lady disparage LJ as nothing more than people reporting about their lunch,"
I chuckled about this description, considering the number of people who use FB and Twitter for the exact same thing. And since Tumblr is all images, people will simply post lunch pics instead of actually saying what they ate.
What I miss are the long, thoughtful discussions on LJ of several years ago. Now we're reduced to shouted comments on FB and Twitter.
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And when some people left, they weren't replaced by others, and so I've seen a downward spiral in activity and new accounts.
However, I guess if I want activity, it has to start with me. I have to be more active on LJ too.
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And some just drifted away from social media in general.
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