Meta Roundup

[Harry Potter] helkamaria: Voldemort and the Ministry: "Anonymous commented on DTCL that villains are scarier when we don't see them, personally, but rather their sinister influence, which got me to think about the two main villains in Harry Potter: Voldemort and the Ministry."

[Stargate] justhuman has a theory and poll on gender bias in genre writing, mainly SF&F, and how (if) that relates to SG1/SG:A.

branchandroot wrote a follow-up post on the previous entry about ratings, and the comments received: Let’s get the requirements issue out in the open, then.

skuf has a poll on the spelling and definition of fic-kink/fic!kink.

IJ news: In announcements, there's a poll on the available siteschemes and which one should be the official default look of the site. Additionally, a new alternate sitescheme has been uploaded: "a black and white theme (sans-tweak and tweak-says for those that don't like him)", called Monodramatic.

InsaneJournal

There've been some discussions on ideas worth mentioning. viridescence asked for a way to better organize and edit userpics, e.g. by implementing a tagging system. 15 discusses the need for a paid support staff and if/how this could be managed.

Meta

cluegirl: Oh, now that's just sad...: "I've just figured out something rather awful; fanfic has spoiled me for 'real' books."

tigresslilly: Fanfiction Post: "Question: Does anyone else find that they are reading R, NC-17, X, or whatever adult rating for fanfiction porn reasons and then skipping the porn? [...] And as long as I'm unleashing my fanfiction secrets, anyone else read so much fanfiction that they can't keep the canon straight anymore?"

the_rck wrote three (untitled) entries with thoughts on fic writing: about inspiration (be it taken from canon or the fic of others), narrative kinks, and what you need to get the feeling you can write fic for a specific fandom.

opengoal posted on Mpreg, its appeal and possible precedents (or lack thereof).

torino10154 has questions about threesomes in fic (the given examples are from Harry Potter, but the questions are more general).

stewardess comments on the upcoming Dreamwidth Studios, based on the LiveJournal Open Source codebase, in Dreamwidth: Not The Answer For Me.

[Supernatural] yourlibrarian wrote about supporting characters in SPN and the way they relate(d) to the two main characters.

Polls

A while ago, reijamira created a poll to gather information on how people feel about a Supernatural newsletter on IJ. Follow-up poll and discussion of the options so far.

lilithilien's poll on journalling preferences was linked in the previous issue; in this post she discusses the results.

First things first: InsaneJournal's ads have been reverted back to using Google text ads only. (announcement)

Now, on to the meta ...

[Spoiler] lenija: Y: The Last Man, über Enden. Potentielle Minispoiler ohne Cut. Weil.: "Früher mochte ich keine offenen Enden, weil ich immer wissen wollte, was weiter passiert. Und daß es nicht aufhört."

das_dingsi: Meandering thoughts on the "watch something else" argument: "Inevitably, someone responds with "well, why are you still watching it? can't be that bad, then, huh?!" or "meh, just watch something else / something better". -- And I get where they're coming from, I just think it's not that simple."

yourlibrarian: SPN Writing in S3: "Some months ago I wrote about what I thought were the best written episodes of S1 and S2, and I thought I'd do the same with S3 now that it's ended. Since we have nearly a third fewer episodes this season I'm going to choose the top 2 instead of top 3 – Mystery Spot by Jeremy Carver and Jus in Bello by Sera Gamble."

musesfool: have you come to raise the dead?: "But I was also thinking about season 3 of Supernatural, and a couple of conversations I've had about it recently, specifically, about the structural and pacing issues, and how Kripke really does remind me of a fanfic writer."

In F-List By Stealth, loqia explains how to bulk import someone's entire f-list into GoogleReader, and talks a little about friending/feed lists in general. (Note: I know that it's mirrored from a blog and says that comments are preferred on the original, but as comments on IJ aren't disabled, I'm listing it here.)


On LiveJournal's updated policy quidelines

bethbethbeth posted the guidelines in her journal, the original post on the lj_policy community is here.

elfwreck ponders whether it's worth "switching back" (or what would be needed to reach that point).

In light of LJ's announcement, lilithilien created a poll on journaling preferences and the factors that would possibly influence one's posting habits.

[Battlestar Galactica] amilliondays: thoughts on BSG, short version: "I still love it. I still love the women from it. I'll watch it to the end, because ultimately my problems with it aren't enough to dampen my fondness and adoration for the things I love about it, for the addiction it feeds. -- But it's still got problems."

[Smallville] odditycollector: A hero's best archenemies are a study in opposites. That's why Clark fights *Brainiac*.: "But then I realized that the problem was just that I was working from the wrong mental model. I'd tuned in expecting some sort of superhero drama, when really I was watching a comedy. It's a parody about these characters who've been sucked into the orbit of Our Hero Who Has An Important Destiny Trust Us... only Our Hero has the brains of a guinea pig and the characters spend most of their time making sure he doesn't walk around with his underwear on the outside of his pants or something."

[cartoon animation in general / Avatar: The Last Airbender] branchandroot: Avatar pick up, VA musings: "The other thing that trips me up, unfortunately, seems to be endemic to US cartoons, and that’s the voice acting. [...] You know. That problem. The one where you listen and think “s/he’s not acting; s/he’s just reading”.

firefly124: Neat bit of meta, found via [info]a_bees_buzz, and some of my related thoughts on AU's: "As with the examples I gave, sometimes you choose to go with the unrealistic option that most people will buy anyway because that's what will work without bogging things down."

rood: Why I think the FanFictionNetBot is a Bad Idea: "Some of you may have heard of it, some may not. The Fan History Wiki now uses a bot to integrate ff.net user data into their database."

lenija: Retrospektion. Spirale geht nicht zu. ;): "2003 habe ich angefangen, Fanfic zu lesen, doch ich wußte damals noch nicht, daß es eine große Internetgemeinde gibt, die auf allen möglichen Niveaus über ihre geliebten Texte diskutiert und deren Mitglieder sich zu einem großen Teil auch darüber definieren, Teil des Fandoms zu sein."

This week's prompts on metametameta are disability-related (inspired by the Blog Against Disablism Day).

Userpics were temporarily switched off because IJ's slowly getting moved to the new server, but should be back up now. Some icons might have gotten lost in the process, but after the move is completed, it shouldn't happen again, ever. squeaky's cleaning up the ads, too. Busy week.

[Supernatural] yourlibrarian: Story types in SPN: "This is not just an essay but a question to the group. [...] Now that I've been reading around in SPN fic for a while I think I can identify a few categories, but I'm interested in other ideas. I'm not focusing on what typical fanfic plots tend to get used [...] but rather, how canon and characters tend to get repeatedly reshaped."

musesfool: the calliope crashed to the ground: 'See, the thing is, I really don't like the "feedback = payment" equation.'

[on IP law] branchandroot: Oddities of ownership: "[O]ne thing I find curious is any author getting wound up over what another author does with “their” character. As though it were the same character. Which, of course, it isn’t."

InsaneJournal's move to another provider is on the way. According to this post in announcements, although the prices of Self-Commited (paid) accounts will have to get raised in the future, it won't be as much as previously stated, and squeaky said they'll "work on delivering some new products" instead.

In ideas, sweetsorcery asks for an increase in interest slots. (YES, PLEASE.)

Updated the Asylum Master List (+1 general asylum promotion).

Meta

boomshadow: Mary Sues and Gary Stus in Various Continuities: "[T[his short guide should help you identify a Mary Sue or Gary Stu character in your favorite fictional universe ..."

[QaF] xie_xie_xie: Hungry!Justin: "But when I use it in a story, Justin's appetite is really a metaphor rather than simply a characterization point. And I think it was in the series, too [...] food, hunger, eating and not eating, preparing food, and offering food are all very strong themes for Brian, Justin, and Brian/Justin not just in Season One but in all five seasons."

metametameta's Thursday prompts are about IP Law. JK Rowling's HP Lexicon suit has been the topic du jour, with slashpine commenting on an AP article and doing a link roundup.

InsaneJournal

No doubt prompted by the recent outage, skuf worried about the future financing of IJ (context) and later linked to synecdochic's LiveJournal post on the topic, where squeaky weighed in via OpenID.

Several polls:

squeaky asks for your opinion on the move to a different hosting provider here.

aristoboule asked if, and why, you have paid or permanent accounts (on IJ and elsewhere).

Follow-up to this post: a poll on people's preferences for off-site IJ refuge communities, here.

(Also: Happy birthday, squeaky! Have a great day!)

squeaky explains the reasons here. No data has been lost.

I also recommend bookmarking IJ's twitter page - Squeaky is usually quick with the updates and giving us relevant information, i.e. what is wrong, what is he going to do to fix it, and how long will it probably take.

General question: as myself and various other people suffered from the typical journaling withdrawal, do you know if there's some sort of "refuge" community elsewhere, where users could post and exchange news during downtimes? I guess GJ is still too unstable, and I don't know much about other journal services, but on the other hand, I'm not sure if people were happy about using an LJ community for that sort of thing. But a central meeting point would be nice. Suggestions?

Eta: I'll set up a poll this Friday to outline the options you mentioned and see what people would prefer. Will link to it here.

Eta2: the poll.

[BtVS, SPN] yourlibrarian: The Emotional Bottom (discusses Dean and Spike in terms of characterization and relationships on the show and top/bottom preferences in fic -- might contain spoilers!)

rubyfruit_pixie: An Anti-Redemptionist's Confession: "Or, How I Learned To Give Up The Ghost And Love Getting Our Heroes To Join The Dark Side."

telesilla: It's 5pm somewhere in the Pegasus Galaxy!: "Discussion in chat this afternoon about booze and SGA characters led me to think about my personal fanon (which is subject to change depending on the requirements of a fic) about the SGA characters and booze ..." (open for other fandoms in the comments)

brimac13 has a poll on shipping, namely if certain shipping preferences have a negative stigma in fandom.

Older posts I didn't want to leave behind:

The recent prompts on metametameta have been job-related (canon jobs, careers in fanfic, and "going pro") and previously elfwreck discussed in-canon parenting (or the lack thereof), for Trek!verse and Harry Potter in particular.

yourlibrarian: Posting habits and fanfic reading (deals with cross-posting content, IJ as a political choice, and journal readership esp. with meta content)

apotheosis: The place of OEL manga: "I thought this might be of interest to us as American mangaka and the fact that no, I don't see that as a contradiction or taboo to refer to myself as one. [...] I still can't help but see a rather hypocritical double-standard."

Journal News:

InsaneJournal has reached 200,000 accounts in just three months. The site was running slow at times, squeaky adresses the issue here. Also, insanity asks people for their ideas on virtual gifts.

rusty_halo made a turorial: How to migrate from LiveJournal to WordPress (and crosspost to InsaneJournal). (Link in the post goes to WordPress, but I'm using this one so people can leave IJ comments.)

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As usual, you can leave links to meta entries by commenting here or on the screened comments entry. General questions can be asked on the FAQ post. :)

First, let me direct you once more to the master list of meta posts at metametameta, which collects all contributions to the Meta Friday event. Also, it's been such a success that it's going to be a weekly feature with prompts; you can read the rules in this post. As the asylum is open for posts all week round, not just on Fridays, there've been more meta entries, such as purplepopple's FanLib: One Year Later, or elfwreck's Slashfic: because women can't recognize their sexuality.* For the rest of this roundup, to avoid double posts I'm going to list the links that haven't been a part of the Meta Friday or haven't been posted to metametameta.

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* yourlibrarian has written more on the subject of "slash as anti-feminist", dissecting the blog post that started it in detail.

roz_morgan: Meta! Meta! Lovely Meta!: "Writers, producers and advertisers like to pidgin hole their demographics. When they get a group they can’t explain for example a large amount of women watching a show about space-ships or monsters they don’t look at it as an indication of having tapped a new market. They seem actually baffled by it."

musesfool: dancing gets her higher than anything else she knows: "But aside from the big huge things that make me click or not click (or click out when they appear), there are smaller, mostly throwaway details, that can cause me to have kneejerk reaction of the bad sort, where I am just completely jarred out of the story and end up clicking out."

IJ, LJ, journaling/archiving in general, Tutorials

brimac13 wonders if people would be interested in an index for friending asylums on IJ. (poll)

schattenstern: untitled post: "I think that IJ is a temporary solution for Fandom at best. [...] Fandom as a whole, and forgive the blantant simplification for a moment, has always wandered from one kind of platform to the next when there was some kind of technological advancement, when the new platform offered more than the old one did."

tabakat: untitled post: "The thing is I feel as though I am being forced to keep a presence [on LJ] because there is nowhere else for me to go to be involved in my other fandoms. With the popularity of journal communities rising the availability of actual website archives and the like for fandoms has gone down."

elance: Decentralize me!: "I don't think I'm alone when I say that the amount of fanfiction which is *solely* posted to LiveJournal communities and not archived anywhere else worries me. I believe strongly that fandom should never be centralized, never be dependent on one site alone to carry it."

Also, maureenlycaon did a post on data backups to store your stories and/or artwork off of your computer, and elke_tanzer wrote a step-by-step tutorial on moving LJ memories into del.icio.us.

Today is a bit peculiar. One, it's LJ Content Strike Day, and two, during the recent LJ upheavals and strike/boycott planning stages, it eventually lead to Meta Friday on metametameta. The premise was: let's not just stop producing content on LJ for that day, let's also have a content party on IJ! People are encouraged to post their meta and leave a link on the master list post, or comment on the meta posts of others. (If you're interested in how it all came about, read this post.)

Many entries that I'd usually link on meta_roundup are already there, and in this case I think it'd be more convenient to let you browse the master list to avoid repetitions. When the Meta Friday is over, I'm going to compare notes and collect the links that aren't on the master list for the recent issue of MR.

For the users who aren't that much into meta or feel unsure about posting their own essays, I've revived the IJ Asylum Meme. (This doesn't mean that fannish contributions aren't allowed, only that one of my main reasons was the wish to offer non-meta fans an option to still provide content on IJ.) It would be great to have more asylum activity, especially with the influx of new users, and the meme hopefully helps with that. The main post -- meme text, FAQ, and participation stats/list of entries -- is located here.

Last but not least, a few words on Metafandom -- you probably remember how it was first set up as a feed, which then refused to work because of feed limitations? In January 2008, the feed was changed into a regular community, metafandom. Commenting and linking on IJ is encouraged, as Metafandom now covers all of the main journal "clone" sites, and they have revised their FAQ accordingly (see here).

It caught me completely unaware, as I don't follow Metafandom -- I had a phase when I needed to GAFIAte and left all kinds of meta-ish comms, and somehow never got back on track -- but I think it's a good thing, helping to connect fandomers which are now partly scattered over various journaling sites. I also think MF and MR can co-exist without any problems -- some MF editors have already stated that they see similarities, but also differences in our approach and our target groups, and I'd agree. I focus exclusively on IJ, including content that may not be fannish but specific to the site (e.g. tutorials and announcements), and have no intention of changing that.
However, there will be double postings where you see the same link(s) appear in both newsletters, and although that may be a bit annoying for readers of both communities, I think it would be rather silly to implement some policy where you can't link to a post in B when it has already been linked in A. Just for the record.

(I've also edited the meta_roundup profile to reflect the changes.)

And... that's it, I think. If there are any questions, feel free to ask, okay?

P.S.: In case you didn't notice (I certainly didn't until last week or so), InsaneJournal's main page now has a line specifically for fanfic writers: Yes we are fanfic friendly. We believe works of fiction are just that. And unless such work infringes on a copyright that does not fall under "fair use" we believe you have the right to post that content.

General Fannish Meta

[bandom: Panic! at the Disco] stele3 wrote a Spencer/Ryan ship manifesto.

On plagiarism:

msilverstar: Plagiarism in fandom: "My problem with this the situation is that the author accepted the praise, awards, and publication as though she deserved credit. If she'd said something about how great a writer Charlotte Brontë was, and explained that a huge part of the story was lifted from the original, that would have been appropriate attribution."

mirabile_dictu: lusus naturae: "It seems to follow a pattern; there's almost always an excuse given. I didn't know it was plagiarism. It's just a coincidence. I had to do it. The excuse is invariably followed by support from friends. What's odd about this case is the studied silence of the plagiarist."

IJ, LJ, Journaling in general

Note: After the InsaneJournal code update, you are now able to track posts/threads and receive notifications when someone friends you. Edit your subscriptions here. (I'm also working on updating the beginner's guide to IJ; it should be finished this evening.)

Many posts deal not only with LJ/SUP's latest move, but also IJ and comparisons between the two platforms.

yourlibrarian: The IJ Only Post: "Given the latest boneheaded move by LJ, there's been a resurgence of talk about why people aren't coming over to IJ. [...] From what I'm seeing the problem isn't a lack of journal moves, it's a lack of community moves."

xie_xie_xie: El Jay: "Because the expansion potential of its userbase is teens and very young 20s, LJ is moving towards increasing the social network component and decreasing the blogging/community component, in the hope they can build a site that is competitive in a Facebook/MySpace universe. [...] IJ doesn't need the kind of userbase that LJ does to succeed, because it's more niche-focused."

telesilla: You don't just pay for LJ, you work for them.: "We're giving them the fruit of our labor, we're giving them our fiction and our meta and, more importantly as I see it, our thoughts about dealing with depression and our posts what it's like to live with chronic pain or what the daily life of a bisexual person is like and they are making money off of that labor. All while pretending that we don't exist."

On the Interests Censorship issue, we have stewardess' entry Circle the one that doesn't belong: (Porn) (Hardcore) (Bondage) (Faeries), and viridescence wrote more on LJ interest censoring. So far it looks like SUP has a strong bias against alternative sexuality (including homosexuality) and, well, fandom.
Last but not least, yourlibrarian compared popular interests on LJ vs. IJ.

yourlibrarian: Hey, you've got your canon in my fanfic!: "So in the rare cases where it actually does happen, I find it disconcerting to see canon following fic. And I'm not entirely sure I like it." (spoilers for the Buffy comic issue #12)

caithyra (in fanficrants): I would like a moment of silence for Canon... Also, childish=/=sexy: "But maybe it's only me that doesn't find it sexy when the man in the relationship is the strong, smart, wise, powerful, domineering, alpha, saviour one and the woman is the weak, protected, whiny, childish, in denial, beta and not knowing her own feelings and wishes one." (spoilers for Naruto & Inuyasha, as the post deals with character development)

madlodger_007 (in fandom_how_to) has a poll on IP-logging and whether it influences commenting.

On InsaneJournal's code update:
squeaky is asking for your input here, mainly on whether the update should be pushed out asap (with major bug fixes done, but there will be some errors and bug fixing work on the live site) or first finish it completely (which would also include notifications).

aerynvala: Interaction Protocol Query: "How the fuck do I interact with bandpeoples? I don't know these kids, just their work and occasionally their blog posts. ... [I]s there a way to glee all over the bandpeoples without being a total stalkery tool?"

InsaneJournal

IJ has some issues with tagging entries (tags won't show up, the tags management page is missing some options et cetera), but there's a way to work around that by [temporarily] using the Lynx sitescheme. Here's a tutorial (in English and German).

LiveJournal

LJ finally posted new policy guidelines. There's a discussion on 07refugees with some links.

Most of the links are fandom-specific today:

blue_rose: On Rose Tyler, the Doctor, his companions and relationships in Doctor Who in general.

[Naruto] caithyra explains why Sasuke is an Uber Gary Stu. (Spoiler alert for the manga, especially for the latest chapters)

beccastareyes: My Love-Hate Relationship with Eureka 7: "So, there you have it. I'd like Eureka 7 a lot more if the gender roles didn't make me want to throw things."

celandineb expanded on last week's poll: which Harry Potter characters make you read or ignore a fic/fan art?

General:

stele3 shares information on how you can receive comment notifications and have icons with OpenID.

The issue of IJ's comment rot has been brought up again (this time in ideas), and branchandroot mentions things you could do to help here.

The master list post has been updated (+2 asylums).

morgandawn: Vidding: Why In The Old Days We Used Bearskins and Stone Knives!: "So every time I curse the difficulties with digital vidding - this vid reminds me it was never that easy."

bethbethbeth: Three HP Comm Notes and one Multi-fandom Thought: "I'm trying to come up with a Universal Theory of Spoiler Protection, but I'm not certain whether the key issue has more to do with the the number of fans of the show/book on your f'list or the significance of the spoiler."

darkrose: Not Your Granddad's Magical Negro: "If you really want to know how we can talk about race in fandom, here's how: White fans have to want to have the conversation with actual fans of color (we do exist!) rather than talking to each other."

telesilla: just don't expect fluffy bunnies: "I have an answer to the question (paraphrased) "why can't we discuss racial fetishes in fandom, the way we can discuss chan or non-con or incest as fetishes." This is a reply I posted to the flocked entry that started all this."

InsaneJournal

persecution created the Unofficial InsaneJournal User Poll Version 2.0. (FYI: 1.0 was this one, from August 2007.)

In regards to the new site schemes: squeaky is looking for volunteers familiar with CSS for IE 5 and 6.

IJ / Asylums / Community-building

greenwitch: Asylum Usage and Habits (poll and discussion) - "[A]sylums here have... not really taken off, and it seems like even asylum creation has dropped (or maybe just outnumbered by the RPGs that seem to be taking over.) So what's the reason? (...) Let's try and figure out what's going, and how we can work on improving the community here."

squeaky announced the purging of old, inactive accounts.

Misc. Fandom Meta

julia_linnea: "Genderswitch" and "Genderplay": What do you think they mean?"

branchandroot: Distribution of labor: "Writing isn’t just having a neat idea, it’s getting a story to coalesce around the idea, complete with transitions and motivations and all the parts that aren’t neat ideas but rather the bones of narrative (...) Given that, I find it a bit surprising that both professional and amateur writers will carry on in equal measure about writing being stolen and ideas being stolen."

Quuer As Folk:

xie_xie_xie: Why they fuck: "I've been thinking about the issue of sex in Brian and Justin fan fiction lately quite a bit ... Of fics that don't just suck totally, there are three broad categories into which I'd put their use of sex scenes ..."

rebeccama: Michael and Ben: "Ben's and Michael's relationship has some real difference from Brian's and Justin's, but that does not make either of the relationships inferior."

Organization of Transformative Works

alchemia: Why I'm not behind the OTW...: "While OTW claims to be inclusive of all, the emphasis has been on the female fanficcers and female vidders, and I wonder where that leaves fandoms that are not predominantly female, and fans that are men, transmen, queergendered, etc., or that enjoy fandom through other avenues, such as fanfilms, re-enactments, cosplay, etc."

Posts for the "Why I Joined The OTW" Week:

bethbethbeth's entry: "Helping to make things better fannishly - even helping to make a single story better - felt great (...) how could I not want to help?"

mirabile_dictu's entry: "I want those opportunities available to everyone possible: to girls of thirteen and women in their eighties, and I don't want them to have to pay for it except with time and energy and love. The world needs safe places for freaks, and fandom can -- no, fandom should! -- be one."

watersword's entry: "OTW's message of pride -- pride in fannishness, pride in the female space that fandom is, pride in the skill it takes us to be fans (meta is hard, y'all, and fiction is harder, I can't even begin to imagine how hard vidding is) -- is one that resonates deeply with me."

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As usual, you can leave links to meta entries by commenting here or on the screened comments entry. General questions can be asked on the FAQ post. :)

I hope you made it all safe and sound into 2008. Happy New Year!

InsaneJournal

squeaky posted 2007 Year In Review in announcements. The stats alone are made of awesomecakes.

aristoboule (in asylum_promo) posted a list with Helpful Hints on Promoting Your Asylum.

Miscellaneous Meta

rubytuesday5681 did a poll: How do you keep track of your favorite fanfic, fanart, and porn?

dragovianknight asks how you "keep track of what you wrote during the year, much less exactly WHEN you wrote it?"

arionhunter: It was just a social experiment. Really!: "As part of my prep work, I read (and took) the official Sex Addiction Screening Test. (...) How would fandom score? So I task you, IJ, with letting me know."

helkamaria: The Weasleys' finances, or why their poverty is self-inflicted: "They aren't the only poor family in the series (cf. the Creeveys), but they are treated as some kind of an example of a good family that is cruelly deprived of the money they'd justly deserve. For myself, I think that their poverty is their own fault, a result of poor money management. And here's why."

Fannish Meta

stele3: Why I Believe Writing Slash Is A Healthy Pasttime: "Reimagining straight characters as gay gives us power. It takes the socially-accepted 'norm' and turns it on its ear, puts it in under our control. It affirms us, makes us less alone."

elfwreck: Anti-Fanfic Bingo, Round 2, part 1 (referring to this post and three of the arguments presented therein)

firefly124: Canon compliance musings: "The post I linked above questions whether people stretch the matter of canon compliance because AU is seen as inferior. Honestly, I think it's more a matter of AU not really telling anybody a whole lot." (Harry-Potter-centric)


InsaneJournal

ardath_rekha took a closer look at IJ's age demographics.

In ideas, there's a discussion about the possibility of automatic age verification for adult-oriented asylums.

asylum_promo is now moderated, so it should be safe to re-friend.

Also, squeaky bought two new servers to deal with the new influx of users.

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As usual, you can leave links to meta entries by commenting here or on the screened comments entry. General questions can be asked on the FAQ post. :)

thecaelum: Tie-in versus fandom, again?: "So, Lee Goldberg's at it again. Seems our brave and intrepid anti-fanfic writer has stumbled upon The Organization for Transformative Works, and is very displeased."

yonmei: Organisation for Transformative Works (aka "An Archive Of Their Own"): "But one of the things that definitely puts me off getting involved in any way with OTW is the fact that while the OTW crew mirror otw_news to IJ and GJ, they disable comments there, so that no community of fans interested in OTW can form anywhere other than on livejournal. It is a very pro-centralisation tactic, and very much in opposition to what I see as the major strength of fandom..."

elfwreck: HAPPY SOLSTICE! Have some meta to wake up from the longest night!: "There is something legitimate and valid about the cry of, "Hey! You can't DO THAT to my character!" And if we want to win not only a potential legal case, but public opinion, we need to acknowledge that concern, and with more than "Ooh, I'd be so thrilled if someone liked my writing enough to write fic about it; I'd let them do anything to my characters!"

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fleshdress asks in a poll whether there'd be any interest in a "epilogue and beyond specific art/fic exchange" for Harry Potter fandom.

InsaneJournal: new site schemes are in the works. squeaky mentioned it in this entry, and ij_siteschemes has been created, with branchandroot already testing a site scheme called Dramatic. (Asylum membership is moderated atm.)

Note: general fandom meta will follow in Issue 37 b.

InsaneJournal / Journal Migration / Misc

squeaky extends the holiday sale until Friday. Also, IJ has a new server, with "about 4x the horsepower" as the old one.
By the way, if IJ is down, you can visit squeaky's Twitter account to see what's going on.

seshen reports that LJ iJournal client for Mac OS X also works on IJ.

sherlock has links on backup/ migration tools for journals and communities.

And although it's on LJ, I decided to include this link to florahart's LJ, because she's posting about IJ's stats and the numbers of newly created accounts.

LiveJournal

diachrony: stuff from the livejournal policy update thread (quotes and summaries).

elfwreck: Discussion between 6A and APT, about the flagging feature (mostly satire).