The future of lj?

[brightly_lit]

So ... how are people feeling about this whole lj-servers-moving-to-Russia thing? I saw on the home page a lot of people were afraid lj would abruptly shut down without warning. Just in case that does happen, I made a dreamwidth account--brightly_lit, same as here--where I'd love to hook up again with you ladies if you make the switch, as well.

I started with lj (under a different name) way back in its heyday in the early part of the millenium. I remember reading in the TOS that your posts and comments would be saved on lj's servers "forever," and I thought, "How cool, to have this thing for posterity when that's so rare. I wonder how they can promise that? But oh well, I guess they wouldn't say it if it wasn't true." Then they sold the company, again and again, and of course it ended up being just words, another tome created and ultimately perhaps lost to time, but if this is the end, it sure was great while it lasted. And I think dreamwidth has a lot of potential (even if for some reason it seems to lack much interaction between users).

I guess personally I think it seems unlikely they'll shut us down without warning, but it seems likely that lj might change a lot, maybe not for the better. Better to be safe than sorry in terms of coming up with a backup plan, in any case, is my opinion. Also, apparently it's quite easy to transfer your whole lj to dreamwidth if you're so inclined. I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on the whole business. I saw it discussed at length on the home page, but I don't think a single person on my friends page mentioned it, so it sounds like none of my friends here, at least are worried, so that's good.

Comments

[alyndra]

Woah, wait, when did LJ ever notify us of getting tagged in a post? I don't think it ever did!

I've had a dreamwidth account practically since it started, same name, love the site although SPN fandom doesn't seem to be active there at all!

[septembers-coda.livejournal.com]

I always got notified if someone tagged me in a post, until recently. Now I do about 30-40% of the time, I'd say. I think you can choose whether you want to be notified or not in User Settings.

[alyndra]

I went and looked, didn't see anything like that. LJ sends notifications if someone replies to you or if you subscribe to a post, and that's about it, unless it might be a paid account feature?

I take it you mean the username icon, not 'tags' which are journal-specific? I would be really shocked if those did anything like you're describing.

[brightly-lit.livejournal.com]

She means when someone wrote out someone's username with lj code, as brightly_lit, virtually anywhere on lj, we would get a notification that we were "mentioned" on lj. I still get these e-mails if someone mentions (tags) a community I mod, but I no longer get them when someone mentions/tags me individually.

[alyndra]

Must be a paid/plus account feature, then. Or possibly no one's ever mentioned me since they added that feature, since I'm pretty positive it didn't exist back in the oughts. 😂

[brightly-lit.livejournal.com]

False. I've never had a paid or plus account, and I always got such notifications, back to the early aughts. Rather than arguing the point with me, why don't you poll other people? Ask if they got notified when their username was mentioned on another person's lj. Perhaps you just never turned that feature on.

[alyndra]

No offense meant, I just saw that it said Plus Account on your profile page.

It really is equally possible that people just haven't mentioned me, as I've always been something of a lurker.

[brightly-lit.livejournal.com]

Oops--I was thinking Plus was a paid kind of account, but yes indeed, I do have a Plus account, and I think I have ever since they introduced them. It's possible it was a feature of Plus accounts, but it's gone now, alas.

[septembers-coda.livejournal.com]

Ditto what BL said. It's a feature I've used a lot with various accounts, going back to about 2003. Doesn't work anymore and appears to be a new change to LJ's functionality.

ETA: I've never had a paid account either, and people on my flist talk all the time about these kinds of user name notifications, so I know that others receive/use them frequently.