factionary

About this entry: this is a compilation of the various complaints against LJ as of late. I believe that the combination thereof merits moving elsewhere, including for (but not limited to) roleplaying communities.

Об этой записи: это компиляция жалобов против ЖЖ. Я верю что из о этого, нам (включая ролевые игри) всем пора уйти на другую сайт. Если вам что-нибудь не понятно, я смогу обяснить по-русски.

There's the usual -- issues of security, functionality, constant downtime and lack of notifications, and more. There's also the fact that Livejournal's entire layout will be undergoing a complete overhaul (explanation here) and that many complain of eye strain as a result of the new design (source). However, customer service is currently one of the biggest problems. The thousands of comments on the various news pages about the most recent changes prove that people are mad. Our concerns are supposedly being taken into account, but there has been no proof of that yet, and some of the highest figures of authority on this site have shown very poor behavior toward the site's users.

ADMINISTRATION

igrick is the head of Livejournal Russia (source, translation). Many of you have by now seen his Twitter account, where he refers to the 100+ pages of angry complaints on the update page as "spam" and openly laughs, saying that everyone will just get used to the changes and deal with it (translation).

The following may not be a professional translation, but I am a native Russian speaker, so here's the gist of some of what's been said by igrick regarding the changes.

• Question from a beta tester: Is there (or will there be) a way to switch back to the old commenting style?
  
  igrick: For now, you can switch back to the old style from the beta. In the future, you won't be able to.
  
  [source]
  
  
• Comment: I wonder how much shit you'll get for taking away the subject lines.
  
  igrick: I already conducted a survey on the subject, the shit was delicious =)
  
  [source]
  
  
• person 1: testing new style of commenting
  
  pretty))
  hooray it's here
  I like it
  
  it's a shame that the subject lines are gone though
  
  person 2: Were they really necessary? I've personally never understood their necessity. IMHO, of course.
  
  igrick: +100500
  
  [Everyone goes on to claim otherwise, Igrick doesn't respond again.]
  
  [source]
  
  
• (part of) Comment: The preview button is gone. Hm. It won't be there anymore? 8)
  
  igrick: Re: preview -- is it really necessary? [and all replies saying YES IT'S NECESSARY are ignored]
  
  [source]
  
  
• Comment: 1. slooooooooooooooooooow
  2: The screen space isn't used economically - too much space, too little info, scrolling so much is tiring.
  
  igrick: 1: This is beta, there's only one server.
  2: Scrolling is free =)
  
  [source]
  
  
• Comment: The purely cosmetic collection of useless space has increased. Question: Why the hell?
  
  igrick: It's more comfortable?
  
  Reply: On a 24-inch monitor at work, I'd agree. On a netbook - I wouldn't say that.
  
  igrick: Understood
  
  [source]
  
  
• Comment: I suggest an option to choose between the old style and the new.
  
  igrick: What would the point be?
  
  [source]
  
  
• Here is the infamous "only 1% of posts contain a subject" comment.
  
  
• igrick: "Then what do I do with those who also pay a ton of money and don't want subject lines?"
  
  [source]
  
  
• This entire thread, where he made an inflammatory comment that he later screened.
  
  
• Comment: [embedded image about Dreamwidth], When will it get through to you, sicko?
  
  igrick: Yes, registration via invite codes has even been omitted for the week.
  
  [source]
  
  
• Someone asks what reasons people have for subject lines, igrick says "RP games"

However, igrick is not the only one.

Anton Nossik, an advisor to SUP, has not reacted favourably to criticism by site users. In an interview given in March 2008, he accused LiveJournal users of "trying to scare and blackmail us, threatening to destroy our business," and stated that a large class of users have as their only purpose bringing harm to LiveJournal and its founders; "their goal is to criticize, destablilize and ruin our reputation." In the interview, he predicted that his likely reaction to such pressure would be to retaliate against the users rather than bowing to their pressure (source).

pmpe, the manager of LJ's support group, has directly accused users of lying about the switches to their account renewal statuses, described further in this entry (source).

AUTOMATIC PAYMENTS

IMPORTANT: Check your account status, people are reporting that their automatic payments have been turned on for them without their consent (source 1, source 2). Attempts at questioning a staff member about this has led to their denial of anything being wrong, both on the English-speaking and Russian sides (source).

MONEY

LiveJournal doesn't seem to care about paying users. More revenue is supposedly made from advertisements than paid accounts. We can scream all we want about being paying customers, but LiveJournal will not listen. In fact, they've disconnected all their phones today so it is impossible to even contact them about anything anymore. Why the 'paying customer' remark is so laughable to them is that running ads on plus accounts contributes more money to them than the paid accounts do. You can choose to not look at most of the ads by reverting to a basic account (source), but that takes you down to 6 icons and the workarounds to make it look like the old style won't work. Can you roleplay your character with only 6 expressions and with this new style? And are you willing to? Things like Blogshopping get far more attention, with a this homepage having gone up one or two days of a poll asking about blogshop statistics from users. For the record, many Singaporean users are not happy with the changes, either.

SECURITY, STAFF INTEGRITY

There was a major breach of privacy in October of 2011. Certain private information could be viewed by others at random during the updates (source). Certain users had complete access to the accounts of others (source 1, source 2, source 3). Please read this entry, pertaining to account suspension, creepy comments on locked posts by LJ staff, and other wrongdoings. More on that here and here.

DREAMWIDTH

A user asked how the import of many RP journals might affect Dreamwidth's servers. The answer:

Don't worry, we've got it under control. We rent our servers instead of colocating for this very reason: so we can add additional server power when we need it. Also, [staff profile] mark (our primary sysadmin) worked on LJ for four years (so he's familiar with the code and the architecture) and has been sysadminning high-performance web applications ever since, including stints at Google and Mozilla, and [personal profile] alierak (our backup sysadmin) has been doing this for just as long. We've got y'all covered. :) (source)

Dreamwidth is also working on the ability to import entire communities. Their administrators currently state that when this is ready, a community with nearly 22,000 entries and close to 2,000,000 comments should take about 2-3 days to fully import (source). It won't be easy, but it will be possible to do this. Another thing worth reading is this comment by Dreamwidth administrator Denise regarding LJ's recent changes.

One feature that most likely will not be implemented on Dreamwidth, however, is ala carte userpics. Please read this which explains the reasons for it. The links provided in that response lead to the essays here and here. A good explanation for how to best migrate on over to Dreamwidth can be found here. It's worth noting that Dreamwidth's staff members are very courteous and respond quickly to any and all concerns brought forth.

Also worth checking out: Why we should leave.

So what does this all mean? I'm not saying "let's all abandon ship and run to Dreamwidth". We have no reason to stay on LiveJournal. Even if we've been here for a long time (5 years in my case), this site clearly has nothing left to offer us, nor do they care about us. Packing up and moving elsewhere is the best option for everyone, Roleplaying communities included -- not immediately, of course, but within the next few months or so. Think about what we're agreeing to support otherwise.