Migrants to IJ, 2007

From LJ News:

There is a new LJ "Explore" area. To opt out:
"First of all, let us reassure you that the only entries that will ever appear in the explore areas are public entries. However, you will have a few options if you don't want a post of yours to be included in the explore areas. You can remove individual posts that are currently appearing in an explore area by clicking on the delete button next to that entry. This will not delete your entry from your journal; it will only remove it from appearing in that explore area. If you want all of your public entries to be excluded from the explore areas, you may opt-out by going to Viewing Options [http://www.livejournal.com/manage/settings/] and checking the box labeled "Explore Area Exclusion." Journal entries posted as private or friends-only are automatically excluded, but this will also exclude your public entries from the explore area."

Two things: LJ is building a content aggregation site with its users content. Users have to opt OUT of it, even if they have their journals set to exclude spiders, search engines, etc. Nice benefit for them, millions of pages of content that their users are, in most cases, paying for with their dollars or by allowing LJ to put ads on their content... and now LJ gets to aggregate that content, too.

And communities can't opt out. Posts made to communities will follow the preferences of the poster, not the community -- so if someone posts to your LJ community and doesn't lock it, BAM... your community can find its posts featured on LJ's "Expore" page.

I have worked in Internet content and community since before there was a World Wide Web. I get the concept of user-generated content and I don't normally have a problem with it. But LiveJournal did not really evolve as a blog or a social networking site or a forum. It's a JOURNALING site, and a lot of its users JOURNAL on it, as in... personal ruminations that, while not precisely private, are also not intended for, nor that well suited for, content aggregation.

It's not even so much that LJ shouldn't be doing this (although IMO they shouldn't -- if you want a post included in the Explore area, it should be a box you can check on each post. Frankly, as an editor, I'd prefer only looking at content the author WANTED included, because it's more likely to be content I'd WANT to include) but rather that it so clearly shows me what kind of site LJ wants to be, and how far that model is from what many of its users do with it.

And certainly, quite far from what I want it for. I already have a blog. I write for a living. I wanted something else from LJ, and I had it for quite a while. Now I have it here, and that's good. I'm happy here. But sometimes I still look at LJ and just have to say: WTF, LJ? WTF?