[info]msilverstar in [info]07refugees

LJ is ending the Basic account option

From May March 12 on, it's see ads or pay up:

Basic Account is an option available to accounts which were created before March 12, 2008. No account created after this date can be turned into a Basic Account. Basic Accounts will not have any advertising displayed on their accounts, but will have fewer benefits and features.

Source: FAQ 38

ETA: fix the date in my text.

ETA 2: Jason Shellen, VP of Product Development for LiveJournal" says it was to make the registration process "easier for new users to understand" To which I say, Apparently they think their users are STUPID. The new ones for needing it "easier" and the old ones for taking that crap.

Also, Brad says no one really asked him. And he's on the LJ Advisory Board -- that was the whole point of the advisory board!

ETA 3: Another advisory board member and "thought leader", Esther Dyson, says that no one talked to her either. And that the person who emailed her can quote her on that.

Comments

What doe Greasemonkey & LJ Ads Butler do?
Greasemonkey allows you to add scripts to modify webpages. Before we got the new site schemes here I was using one to change the site layout for instance.

LJ Ads Butler is a script to remove all the ads on LJ. It goes a bit farther than Adblock and also removes those little traces of the ads like the text that says "advertisement" and the little bits of space and bordered boxes and such that Adblock leaves behind. With this script you can't tell that there were ever ads there to begin with.