(no subject)

[aella_irene]

ONE DAY CONTENT STRIKE

For one day, Friday, March 21, make no posts. Make no comments. Let there be NO new content added to LJ.

SUP obviously does not realize that Basic users have given something of value to them, that it is content that drives the site.

So, for one 24-hour period, from midnight GMT to midnight GMT, let's see how many people we can get to pledge to contribute NO CONTENT.

This will create a permanent downward spike in the daily-posts statistics, a permanent reminder of the power of the userbase.

Full information at The Fox's Den.

SPREAD THE WORD!

Comments

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

Basic users don't include me.

[ataniell93.livejournal.com]

No, but you're going to enjoy your paid account a lot less if they all disappear.

I am, personally, 12 paid user accounts...and 100+ Basic ones. (Aella knows why :))

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

...you mean I won't be able to post Kara/Anders fic anymore? I won't be able to randomly make icons and desktops? What's LJ gonna do, come break my fingers?

[ataniell93.livejournal.com]

There will be fewer people there to give you props for it.

Look, if you don't want to do it, you don't have to, but I think it's very short-sighted to say that because you're paid, what happens to the Basic level doesn't affect you.

It's becoming quite clear based on the timelines and discussions at no_lj_ads that a lot of things--like the Strikethrough, Deletegate, &c--were designed to make LJ more appealing to SUP and potential advertisers. The reason that content on broadcast TV is much more heavily censored than content on cable is that cable is paid by subscribers and broadcast TV is paid by advertisers. Advertising dollars are the primary motivation for censorship in the USA where the LJ servers reside, and the USA's "family protection" (read: anti-gay, anti-sex, anti-choice) groups are the ones who exert heavy pressure on advertisers not to support content that they don't want to see.

If the site wants to make money it could go paid-only, with several levels of supporting membership, and be like cable; it could even return to the invite code system, where you got 12 account creation codes to give away for every month of paid time you bought. Lightning War got its start that way--the original paid journals in LW were paid so that we could create the free users' accounts.

I'm sure that supporting dozens of free accounts is a drain on the site, but there are other ways to increase revenue without converting all free accounts to Plus. Simultaneously with the disappearance of Basic account creation, the interests "bisexuality", "fanfiction", "faeries", "depression," "pain," "boys," and "girls" were removed from the Most Popular Interests page for new users.

There are links to all of this in my journal. I think that even most of them are public. It's a serious problem.

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

Find me the mythical thousands of basic users who love my fic, and maybe I'll think about it.

[sollersuk.livejournal.com]

What worries me (amongst other things) is that the removal of fanfic from the Most Popular Interests page may be followed by banning fanfic communities and then by banning fanfic. And of course if it's gone from the page, it will be hard for people to notice what is happening.

[owl]

What proportion of LJ is fandom, I wonder? And do SUP know it?

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

I... Seriously, I was actually speechless when I got the comment notification at work. And then I cracked the frell up.

You do understand that LJ does NOT equal fandom, right? And that fanfic ALSO does not equal fandom? And that fandom certainly has options for posting fanfic elsewhere?

Because, honestly? The only thing fanfic being banned from LJ (which would, in theory, require hundreds of man hours as they try to keep people from posting it and kill every new account as soon as it becomes clear that's what the poster is posting) would do is make me have to update my website more than once every two years. I might even have to update my ff'net account in real time, or use my deadjournal or my journalfen account, or... And I'm sorry if you're too young to understand this, post it to a mailing list.

This is not some elusive Government Conspiracy Cracking Down on the Innocents. This is a business, trying to ignore content it thinks might be a bit hinky, so that the grey area STAYS THERE. And meanwhile, here's Fandom, rearing itself up on its hind legs and bawling for mommy.

[owl]

What, you don't have a single friend who's Basic?

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

I have absolutely no idea, but if they've already got a basic account, they're not trying to create a new one...

[owl]

How long do you think SUP is going to keep Basic accounts at all?

[kaesa.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting about this! Knowing me I'll forget and comment some, of course, because I have a mind like a sieve, but maybe it'll be a gummed-up sieve for once.