[info]ex_enamour175 in [info]07refugees

Livejournal recently suspended my accounts without reason and without explanation. I opened a support ticket about it but my questions are going ignored and they aren't responding to me. I've kept asking them about it in my ticket but I gave up. I can't understand it, I did nothing to deserve a suspension. I didn't think that debating with people and arguing were a bannable offense but I could be wrong. I don't know if someone kept flagging me or what. I wasn't the only person suspended that day either Maybe someone here can shed some light on the situation?
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Posted on Dec. 17th, 2007 at 05:18 pm | | Leave a comment | Add to Memories | Tell a Friend

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[info]ex_enamour175

I was in some drama communities but as far as I could tell no one from them got suspended. I don't know if it's because they're cracking down on content and I have Lolita as an interest or what. I just don't know.
Posted on Dec. 17th, 2007 11:09 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]prettyparadox

Like stupid_free, sf_drama or something? I took those comms off my Friends page because all the idiocy was clogging up my F-list. Anyways, sometimes the mods ban members for violating rules within the community, but it's usually not something LJ itself suspends journals over. I don't think listing Lolita as an interest should have done anything either, especially given the first suspension fiasco. I'm sorry. It sucks that they have a ban first, ask questions later, but they should get back to you soon, because like I said with the ljsecret mod, LJ did reinstate her journal.
Posted on Dec. 17th, 2007 11:14 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]ex_enamour175

I wasn't banned from any community.

I hope they do get back to me. One of my journals had a lot of memories in it.
Posted on Dec. 17th, 2007 11:15 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]pen

Is it possible one of your older accounts was banned from a community and you accidentally pulled a ban evasion?
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 12:55 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]ex_enamour175

The only thing I can think of was the great race wank. I was suspended on rockboxx around this time last year but they unsuspended me.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 01:08 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]pen

It's very possible that it could be that. Maybe a community mod banned you peremptorily.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 01:15 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]ex_enamour175

Nope.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 01:16 am (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

They only reinstated it after a ruckus was raised over it.

It is VERY typical of LJ Admin to ban/perma delete THEN ask questions. That's what they did with StrikeThrough</strike> after all.

Lolita as an interest may very well have gotten her banned, as interests relating to that sort are now unsearchable, so it's possible that someone did flag her, and did get their friends to mass flag her as well, purely from that interest or because they hate the way she debated in the comms.
Posted on Dec. 17th, 2007 11:39 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]prettyparadox

woe, slippery slope

Taking comm drama to personal journals is both cowardly and a violation of LJ TOS. I can only hope that LJ/6A/Soviet-fucking-Union resolves this crap as soon as possible.

Livejournal should have their legal team look up Reno v. ACLU, Miller v. California. The law recognizes the difference between virtual and actual child pornography; namely, in actual child pornography, children are physically abused. That does not apply at all to Lolita, a book, an idea and protected speech. Plus under the "SLAPS test," Lolita certainly qualifies as Serious Literary value in this day and age.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 12:13 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

Re: woe, slippery slope

Given the recent censoring that LJ/^A did prior to the sale, do you really think they give 2 shits about the literary value of a book, when many, MANY people use that term to denote underage sex, etc and THAT'S all they see when they see that as an interest?

Given, again, their recent censoring of search terms, do you really think LJ Abuse/SUP really give 2 shits about protected speech?

While the LAW may recognise the obvious differences, LIVEJOURNAL DOES NOT. They have stated as much before as well, during StrikeThrough when Warriors for Innocence went on their rampage and managed to con 6a/LJ into their campaign.

All LiveJournal cares about is the bottom line and the money they get from their advertisers. They could give a rat's ass about whether or not our freedom of expression or freedom of speech or what have you are being impeded. They could care less about whether you are talking about a book or about sex. All they see is what they THINK the word could mean in THEIR world and to them, that's enough to get you banned, period.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 01:40 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]prettyparadox

Re: woe, slippery slope

I didn't say I was holding my breath, nor did I equate the LJ with the ACLU. I merely pointed out that LJ, while they had good intentions to cut down on child pornography, went about it the wrong way. But the other side to it is that LJ has a right, as a private company, to have whatever shitty TOS policy they want. And while people whose journals were wrongfully deleted were understandably upset, the reaction as a whole was ridiculous and counterproductive. Both sides handled things badly. Yes LJ backed themselves into this corner, but maybe there was a time when service providers didn't sell out their users, and it seems like we're past that.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 02:24 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

Re: woe, slippery slope

My response was based off of your response as follows- Livejournal should have their legal team look up Reno v. ACLU, Miller v. California. The law recognizes the difference between virtual and actual child pornography; namely, in actual child pornography, children are physically abused. That does not apply at all to Lolita, a book, an idea and protected speech. Plus under the "SLAPS test," Lolita certainly qualifies as Serious Literary value in this day and age.


I never said you equated LJ with the ACLU. I said that they don't care what you think about the book, only that THEY see it as a sex interest key word and have censored it accodingly. Their good intentions were the result of Warriors for Innocence declaring jihad essentially on LJ, whereupon LJ reacted in the only way they knew how too- by overreacting.

Yes, they have a right to whatever ToS they want. But we have the right to say, we want our money back that we paid in good faith, especially when that same shitty ToS is being disregarded BY that same provider.

LJ will NEVER be able to work their way out of this fiasco. It's too late for that.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 02:47 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]prettyparadox

Re: woe, slippery slope

"Jihad" is a bit, make that far too extremne to apply to LJ and whatever drama it has. Oh great, Godwin's Law 2.0. But anyways, I digress. However horrible LJ's TOS is, it's not unlike any other service provider or company, which upon reading the fine print, says they can collect whatever information they want and refuse service should they so choose to, for whatever undisclosed reason. It sucks. But it's not a battle that fandom or users can win, so I don't see how antagonizing LJ helped. By antagonizing, I don't mean taking a help ticket and asking why such and such a course of action was taken, but making those stupid icons, "fuck not with fandom, for fandom fucks back (without lube)"?? The self-righteous wank gets tiresome. But I'll stop here, because the OP had nothing to do with that. With management comes liability, so from LJ's perspective, they're just trying to cover their asses. Eventually, ad hopefully in this case, they'll make reprimands, even if they're not worth much anymore.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:39 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

Re: woe, slippery slope

Jihad is exactly what it's been called on LJ. Heh.

Personally, I think we can make ourselves better heard by talking with our money. By not renewing accounts and by leaving.

And it's not just about fandom anymore. It's about anyone and everyone being affected by the recent changes they've brought about. It's gone way beyond fandom, and did so months ago.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:47 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply
Re: woe, slippery slope - [info]prettyparadox - Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 04:01 am (UTC)
Re: woe, slippery slope - [info]wolfsilveroak - Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 04:09 am (UTC)

[info]broken_crystal

so it's possible that someone did flag her, and did get their friends to mass flag her as well,

I saw something like that on one of their posts about the adult content flagging, like they don't really investigate something based on one flag but if they get a certain number of complaints then they automatically handle it as abuse.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:22 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

yup, they did indeed say that. only after a certain number of flags on one post/journal will they 'investigate', which means, pull the account.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:34 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]broken_crystal

That is pretty messed up, since basically it's a popularity contest and anybody can gang up on someone to get them suspended.

Oh, wait... that's not anything new.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:46 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

It was brought up to them numerous times the day they instituted the flagging.

Their response? Make it impossible to flag their own posts.

So I guess it's going to take people leaving and taking their money with them for LJ/SUP to realise that some changes were plain ignorant.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:49 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]broken_crystal

HAHA I remember when everybody flagged the post that they made about the adult content.

I hope enough people stop paying for the service that it makes a difference and they notice something is going on.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 04:36 am (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]heiko

Btw, is there any proof that accounts are actually banned from flagging?

Just asking, I will search for it myself when I have more time, but it only mentions acting on the flagged posts/accounts but it does not state directly that it will be suspended or somesuch. I merely assumed that flagging would lead to a higher rating (such as over 18).
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 05:12 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]broken_crystal

I didn't see LJ themselves say that, but this is the post I saw where everybody was saying they were going to flag it: http://community.livejournal.com/lj_biz/243697.html?view=16534769

So it doesn't surprise me if LJ got sick of it and just made it so people couldn't flag the entry or did something to the people who were doing it.

I can't find the exact comment where someone from LJ support said that if they get a certain number of complaints then it will be handled as abuse. I just went to the links in my IE history and some of them went back to the main post so I think that comments have been deleted. Here are the other posts I saw about it:
http://community.livejournal.com/lj_biz/244122.html
http://community.livejournal.com/lj_policy/1227.html
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 03:40 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]ciaan

Flagging isn't supposed to lead to banning, just to having labels/filters/warnings put on the post. The flagging system is separate from the abuse system, even though handled by the same team. However, I haven't yet seen them clarify what would happen if someone just flagged illegal material rather than reporting it to abuse. But if they are suspending accounts that have merely been flagged, then they are going against the statements they made.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 08:37 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]ex_enamour175

But if they are suspending accounts that have merely been flagged, then they are going against the statements they made.

That wouldn't surprise me.
Posted on Dec. 18th, 2007 08:41 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]hearmemeep

I know there's some speculation going around that the suspension was because of multiple journals, but that doesn't make much sense. I know lots of people who have multiple journals for various reasons - dream journals, journals for their pets, journals for RPG characters to use on RPG communities, ect, and they're still there...
Posted on Dec. 19th, 2007 05:00 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]prettyparadox

Having multiple journals is fine - if it wasn't, why would LJ allow users to register 10,000 journals with the same email account? What they're referring to is having multiple journals/users flag a specific journal, as discussed above.

Yeah, there are people who keep journals to separate personal, icon and fic stuff.
Posted on Dec. 19th, 2007 07:33 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply