Being heard in the right places
Just thought I'd toss this out here. I still really don't want to talk about it. But several very good friends of mine are in the position I was in, and they do not deserve to face the wrath of fandom.
From the perspective of having been on the other side of the fence, here's a list of things that will probably not work to establish a dialog:
1. Personal attacks against people who are just doing a very, very difficult job.
2. Cat macros.
3. Profanity.
4. Appeals to "rights" or the First Amendment.
5. Sadly to say, email to feedback@livejournal.com (as it is read by the people from 1. Who -- I can assure you -- already agree with you.)
6. Spam.
7. Demands that LJ hire a "PR person". (LJ has several. Getting something wrong doesn't mean that they're not trying.)
Things that probably will work better:
1. Reading all of the posts in lj_biz to be sure you understand what's going on.
2. Summarizing your reaction, your opinion, and what you think should be done in one paragraph or less, as politely and as clearly as possible.
3. Printing that paragraph on the back of a postcard.
4. Mailing that postcard to Six Apart, addressed to Barak Berkowitz (CEO), Scott Kraft (EVP, Marketing), and David Tokheim (EVP & GM, Consumer). (The corporate website is out of date, and doesn't list David yet.)
Whatever you believe about Six Apart -- and I do believe that they're a good company with a strong commitment to free expression; I know that I will never be able to convince anyone without a ten-thousand-word essay about why -- this whole debacle has turned into a situation where everyone involved is getting vicious, personal, and inflamed.
I love LiveJournal. I love LiveJournal so deeply, so passionately, that I've given it years of my life. I know that so many of you love LiveJournal too, because you wouldn't be so passionate about it if you didn't. I know that "fandom" is not LiveJournal, that fandom existed before LiveJournal and will continue to exist long after.
I also believe that LiveJournal is the best place for fandom to be. I have my reasons, and again, ten thousand word essay about why, but it boils down to a few facts: there is no other service out there with the same tools, resources, and infrastructure as LiveJournal; there will likely not be another service with etc for a very long time, if ever, because the level of infrastructure required is stunning; being on a service that is not fannish-specific means that there is a much smaller risk, for fandom, of the service as a whole being shut down; and finally, I believe, from my personal experience, that Six Apart is trying very, very hard to place the absolute minimum restrictions they think they can get away with without assuming a level of risk and liability that risks the stability and long-term viability of the service as a whole.
Again, I know I can't convince people of that last point without a lot of examples I can't give. I may even be wrong. I don't know; I'm not sure. But I honestly and genuinely believe it.
It's hard for people outside of fandom to understand fandom. I love fandom; I really fucking love fandom. But some of the impressions that certain subsets of "fandom" give to outsiders are very, very difficult for a mundane to get. They always have been, and they always will be. The people who make the decisions for LiveJournal are mundanes. They want to be fandom-friendly; they're trying very hard to be fandom-friendly. But some fen and some fannish behaviour is very hard for a mundane to understand.
A series of polite, respectful, calm postcards -- because a single paragraph on a postcard is a lot easier for someone to take in than that ten-thousand word essay -- is a much, much stronger argument to a mundane business than a five-thousand-comment cat macro thread. No matter how funny the cat macros might be.
(I'm leaving comments on for this one, but I probably won't be replying. I am so burned out it's not even funny.)
[Edit: Also, this essay has a lot of very interesting things for people to think about. EDIT AGAIN: Apparently he's running a referer-check that will insert your LJ username if you follow the link from your own friends page/journal; I didn't see that, because I came across it in a different way. There's nothing to worry about.]
EDIT, Thursday: Fuck a duck, people, most of you are wonderful, but these comments are not the place for debate I am trying to HELP YOU HERE.
From the perspective of having been on the other side of the fence, here's a list of things that will probably not work to establish a dialog:
1. Personal attacks against people who are just doing a very, very difficult job.
2. Cat macros.
3. Profanity.
4. Appeals to "rights" or the First Amendment.
5. Sadly to say, email to feedback@livejournal.com (as it is read by the people from 1. Who -- I can assure you -- already agree with you.)
6. Spam.
7. Demands that LJ hire a "PR person". (LJ has several. Getting something wrong doesn't mean that they're not trying.)
Things that probably will work better:
1. Reading all of the posts in lj_biz to be sure you understand what's going on.
2. Summarizing your reaction, your opinion, and what you think should be done in one paragraph or less, as politely and as clearly as possible.
3. Printing that paragraph on the back of a postcard.
4. Mailing that postcard to Six Apart, addressed to Barak Berkowitz (CEO), Scott Kraft (EVP, Marketing), and David Tokheim (EVP & GM, Consumer). (The corporate website is out of date, and doesn't list David yet.)
Whatever you believe about Six Apart -- and I do believe that they're a good company with a strong commitment to free expression; I know that I will never be able to convince anyone without a ten-thousand-word essay about why -- this whole debacle has turned into a situation where everyone involved is getting vicious, personal, and inflamed.
I love LiveJournal. I love LiveJournal so deeply, so passionately, that I've given it years of my life. I know that so many of you love LiveJournal too, because you wouldn't be so passionate about it if you didn't. I know that "fandom" is not LiveJournal, that fandom existed before LiveJournal and will continue to exist long after.
I also believe that LiveJournal is the best place for fandom to be. I have my reasons, and again, ten thousand word essay about why, but it boils down to a few facts: there is no other service out there with the same tools, resources, and infrastructure as LiveJournal; there will likely not be another service with etc for a very long time, if ever, because the level of infrastructure required is stunning; being on a service that is not fannish-specific means that there is a much smaller risk, for fandom, of the service as a whole being shut down; and finally, I believe, from my personal experience, that Six Apart is trying very, very hard to place the absolute minimum restrictions they think they can get away with without assuming a level of risk and liability that risks the stability and long-term viability of the service as a whole.
Again, I know I can't convince people of that last point without a lot of examples I can't give. I may even be wrong. I don't know; I'm not sure. But I honestly and genuinely believe it.
It's hard for people outside of fandom to understand fandom. I love fandom; I really fucking love fandom. But some of the impressions that certain subsets of "fandom" give to outsiders are very, very difficult for a mundane to get. They always have been, and they always will be. The people who make the decisions for LiveJournal are mundanes. They want to be fandom-friendly; they're trying very hard to be fandom-friendly. But some fen and some fannish behaviour is very hard for a mundane to understand.
A series of polite, respectful, calm postcards -- because a single paragraph on a postcard is a lot easier for someone to take in than that ten-thousand word essay -- is a much, much stronger argument to a mundane business than a five-thousand-comment cat macro thread. No matter how funny the cat macros might be.
(I'm leaving comments on for this one, but I probably won't be replying. I am so burned out it's not even funny.)
[Edit: Also, this essay has a lot of very interesting things for people to think about. EDIT AGAIN: Apparently he's running a referer-check that will insert your LJ username if you follow the link from your own friends page/journal; I didn't see that, because I came across it in a different way. There's nothing to worry about.]
EDIT, Thursday: Fuck a duck, people, most of you are wonderful, but these comments are not the place for debate I am trying to HELP YOU HERE.