Migrants to IJ, 2007

I've been reading the comm for awhile, and so far no one's posted about this here.
Hopefully you know of the beheading video. If not, some links to enlighten:

Radio Free Europe: Controversy Grows Around Russian Beheading Video
NY Times: Beheading and Shooting by Russian Neo-Nazis on Video

Okay. That done, on to the meat of the issue.

Gee, this looks like a screencap from the video:
http://pics.livejournal.com/vik23/pic/0000q6tb/
Hosted right on LJ's own gallery service, no less.
His journal: http://vik23.livejournal.com (plug that url into google's russian->english beta, and see what you get.)

Snagged and (badly)translated from here (emphasis mine):
As has been discovered, a suspect is a 23-year-old Victor Milkov, a student absentee office Adygeyskogo Technological University. He was the National Socialist Party of Russia, and to life earns painting orders. Mr Milkov blogging in "Living Magazine" (Livejournal?) by anyone "vik23." This web diary on August 12 has reference to the spot, and August 13 -- Party statement that it is the armed wing of the National Socialist Society (PDF), together known participate in the "Russian marches and disperse gay parades. Yesterday against Mr. Milkova a criminal case was opened under Article 282 of the Russian Criminal Code (incitement of ethnic hatred), which provides for punishment of up to five years' imprisonment.

...So he's being charged, and his content remains up, untouched? (I can understand the necessity of keeping evidence for prosecution; however, this doesn't necessarily require said evidence remain online for all those hypothetical children to see. HELLO? MCFLY?)

LJ interest search for "white power". Notice all the Russian-language comms. Plug those comm urls' into Google's R>E engine, and let the hate speech and racism flow forth. Where's the outrage? Where's the open letters, the petitions, and all the spotlight?

Oh, right. LJ News just announced back-to-school v-gifts, and gratuitously plugs the shit out of Diet Pepsi Max (even going as far as to offer journal and mood themes!) hoping that everyone will get distracted. Because nothing says "I love you" more than a virtual diet pepsi max!

Dear LJ: Nice to know that stopping HP slash fanart, supporting anorexia, and chugging Pepsi's cock are more important than actually dealing with hardcore hate speech ToS violations. It's not like anyone's died, right?

LJ/6A should just come right out and admit that they're being 'selective' about whom they choose to apply the rules to.



Crossposted to a few other comms; apologies if you see twice.



I *really* wish i could install the russian text plugin, into my head. This language barrier crap needs to go.

As all of you all settle in here, will you please go back to LJ just once more to give me some information in this poll? It's at least a way to gauge what business they had, have lost, or might be losing - and in what coveted demographic groups.

http://community.livejournal.com/innocence_jihad/207287.html

Please feel free to pimp/pass around. Thank you!

LJ has found a new way to get advertising - http://news.livejournal.com/102286.html

Virtual gifts brought to you by Diet Pepsi Max.  

Does anyone else have a WTF?  

Suble, aren't they?

Does anyone have a screenshot of or remember who posted the top-level content in this thread? As you can see from the responses, the commenter had been defending LJ's actions on the basis that 'fan art depicting UNDERAGED characters in explicit sexual situations is child porn and possibly obscene under US law.'

I doubt it was this comment the user was suspended over, but the fact that someone ostensibly arguing that LJ's inconsistent and baseless 'policy' 'clarifications' are laudable and required in order to comply with the law could themselves be found guilty of a TOS violation, nearly simultaneously with the comment, is surprising.

Depending on the circumstances of the suspension, perhaps this example might even be the wake-up call other LJ users need to get them to to realise that ambiguous and arbitrary policies are a danger to all users, not just some theoretically expendable fringe of fandom.

ETA: Now cross-posted to the fandomtossed community on greatestjournal, here, and the innocence_jihad community on livejournal, here. Thanks to brownbetty for the technical assist.

This letter asks for "LJ/SA to not conflate the terms 'child pornography' with 'content LJ deems obscene or objectionable.'"

The OP asks you to "please sign this post if you were insulted or are upset by LJ/SA's repeated conflation of the terms 'possibly obscene explicit under 18 fan art' and 'child pornography.'

You can sign it here.

Thanks, keieeeye.

perseph2hades has written a brief essay titled "I'm sorry, did you say the apocalypse is here?"

http://perseph2hades.livejournal.com/143367.html?format=light

Getting pissed off and yelling back at LJ and demanding accountability does not kill fandom and doesn't mean we're ruining the fun. It just means we respect ourselves enough to not want to be treated like trash.

It seems that the LJ admins posted an update on lj_biz.

Y'know...I'm having difficulty accepting the possibility that the folks at LJ are being sincere this time. It's not the fact that there are still large gray areas insofar as what is and is not acceptable. It's the fact that this sort of thing happened once before with Strikethrough and the LJ admins promised that they would no longer ban users without warning, yet did exactly that earlier this month. They're trying to seem sincere with this newest post, yet how can any of us have any faith in their promises when they've made promises a couple months ago then turn around and break them?

beyond_lj (at LJ, with backup at IJ) is a community where artists, writers and fans can leave info about their backup accounts or websites in case they decide to - or are forced to - move from LiveJournal, even if their current LiveJournal accounts are still in use.

It is also the place where people who own or moderate communities on LiveJournal can leave information regarding where the community has backup, where it will be moving or where it has already moved.

(It is not a place, though, for people who jump the opportunity and create their own new communities/asylums which have little to do with the original LJ comm. There are other places that list that.)

beyond_lj is active and the list of users with backup accounts is updated every day. We have quite a few comments already, but we would like more people to know about us :)

ETA: Please read the comments to this post (and here)! Many commenters have pointed out that mskala (Matthew Skala), the author of the second article linked below, is wrong on U.S. law, and this casts much of his article into question.

There are many reasons (also acknowledged by M. Skala, incidentally) to be very displeased with Six Apart and LiveJournal *completely aside* from the question of legality/illegality in fandom pursuits.

I linked to the article because I think it's worth discussing ~ and in fact the discussion here has been very educational and enlightening. I'm very grateful so many knowledgeable folks are participating and pointing out the flaws in the arguments presented. [/end ETA]

---

And now for some points that may have been overlooked:

Synecdochic posts on why LJ is the best place for fandom to be.

And

A refreshing (and frightening) dose of perspective:

The Terrible Secret of LiveJournal.

"[...] A lot of material, even in what fandom thinks of as its mainstream - including material that you like to read and look at - is illegal. That's the terrible secret of Livejournal.

In light of this terrible secret, and in light of the imperfect world in which it's all happening, Six Apart's actions actually make a whole lot of sense and aren't nearly so evil as fandom people are saying. [...]"

I strongly encourage you to read the entire article. I wanted to include more quotes, but it got far too long, as I wanted to copy over almost everything. The writer explains just how 6A/LJ has been supportive (and continues to support) fandom in spite of strong reasons not to, but also explains what 6A/LJ have done wrong that led him to leave the service himself.

He also points out that 6A/LJ caused their own problems when it comes to the proanorexia community flap:

"Six Apart has been very stupid in presenting a defence of pro-anorexia as being okay, instead of saying that it's legal and that's the end of the issue. By even considering the question of whether pro-anorexia is okay in a moral or social-responsibility sense, they (first) invite argument on that point, which they will inevitably lose; and (second) allow people to think that illegal fandom material could be tolerated if it were argued to be okay in a moral and social-responsibility sense. Six Apart should be directing attention to the law, saying that they'll follow the law and no other standard, and they should be refusing to engage in debate on the morality and social responsibility of hosting any given content."

It's taking me far too long to post this as I keep wanting to add more and more quotes. Just go and read.

Scarily enough, I learned (where have I been?!) that there's a strong fundie-backed movement to completely do away with social networking sites, period. And all they need is the right ammunition.

Oy.

If you came from "that other journaling site" and haven't already seen it, this is awesome. It's basically a community where you comment if you have or had a paid account and have decided not to keep your paid account in protest of what 6A is doing. It seems small at the moment, so pimp this out to your f-lists. Let's show 6A how much money they're losing due to asshattery.

http://aura218.livejournal.com/39160.html?page=1&view=115960#comments

Aura218 has gathered a list of staff and volunteers at El Jay and things they've said throughout the lj_biz comments.
Anyone who wishes may gander a look.

She requests direct link rather than copy and paste of her entry should anyone want to do so.

spike

here are a couple more links:
from http://community.livejournal.com/innocence_jihad/190807.html
"Apparently, an internet business is not something the Department of Consumer Affairs can help with." but, there is info to the California Department of Justice, Office of the Attorney General (AG)

and I posted on GJ's FandomTossed about BBB info:
http://fandomtossed.greatestjournal.com/65189.html
which, yes, is not a government agency, and they can ignore complaints. However, it all goes on Public record. Records that *are* looked at when companies go public/try to sell.