An Open Letter To fandom

[ivyblossom]

Dear fandom,

So, as you know, Livejournal decided to suspend accounts that had certain troubling items listed as interests. I had better not be the first person telling you about this; it's all over the place here, and it's all over the place in general. They suspended a bunch of journals, communities, etc. for not being the kind of community Six Apart wants to build. That action was in reaction to Warrior for Innocence, which looks like every other damn troll who shows up and tries to play the shame game with fandom. Except this time they targeted Livejournal as a business and got on the horn to the advertisers. And Livejournal caved. Hey, if "incest" is in your interests, you must be bonking your little sister, right? Surely! And you're probably encouraging all your friends to do the same! Heck, having "incest" in your lj interest means you're using lj to promote child abuse! It surely doesn't mean that you're a victim of incest, no sir.

After the mass journal suspension, livejournal said nothing to the livejournal community, but did interviews with the wider media, took time out to post lengthy rebuttals on metafilter, all without actually mentioning it on news. And the comments poured in there anyway, because everyone was waiting for something.

Way too long a time passed.

So the big cheese finally responds. And it looks like a fairly nice response. But pay attention:

It is now clear that in an unfortunate number of cases these journals were suspended for easily correctable problems in their profiles that would then allow them to be reinstated and that this was not communicated to the journal or community owners at all.

Oh, they didn't know! It was an accident, right? They just didn't realize that innocent fiction journals or communities about culture and literature, not to mention survivor communities, would get caught in the crossfire.

Wrong.

They knew this would happen. How do I know this? Because we were warned. I have no idea who did the warning, I don't even remember who posted the warning under flock so that I saw it. I've had a busy week and I didn't really dwell on it, but I saw the warning come out: LJ is up to something, it's related to those warriors for innocence wackos, they're going to purge journals and comms with X, Y and Z in the interests, edit your interests now to avoid it. They knew very well that people would get caught in the crossfire, fandom folks in particular, and clearly some staff members at Six Apart didn't feel right about it. So they leaked a bit of info into fandom to help people prepare for it. At this point I'm sorry I didn't take the warning more seriously, consider my friends here in fandom, and repost the warning under an flock myself. I presumed that because I was seeing it, most people were. I'm sorry for that. And I'm sorry if I'm reposting information I shouldn't be; I don't want to get anyone into trouble. Again, I have no idea who leaked the information, or to whom it was leaked. And good luck going through my friendslist trying to work out who it could be; I don't even remember what filter I was looking at when I saw it (if I was looking through my filters at all).

However, whoever that person (or persons) are, they did their best to prevent this disaster, and should be applauded for that. I'm nervous to even post this information because I'm pretty sure it was meant to be super-sekrit, and I don't want anyone to get into trouble. But let's look at this again:

It is now clear that in an unfortunate number of cases these journals were suspended for easily correctable problems in their profiles that would then allow them to be reinstated and that this was not communicated to the journal or community owners at all.

Well, it was communicated to those people. Fandom is not doing anything illegal, and if a fandom journal says "incest" it's not because they're promoting incest. That's pretty clear (at least, to us: it's probably not to Livejournal, "thin veneer" and all that, don't forget about that line, whatever you do). But given how it was communicated, it's pretty clear that their staff weren't allowed to communicate this tidbit of information to people who would get harmed by this brand new policy. Which is why I only know it as a super-sekrit friendslocked rumour. They could have let us know about this in some better way, and opted not to.

We never intended this policy to cause the removal of journals that were have perfectly valid discussions about literature, law or culture. We never intended the policies to take down journals or communities clearly opposed to illegal activities but clearly we did. We love our members of fandom and respect their role in our community. We made a mistake and now we are going to try to fix it.

I don't buy this, not for one second. If someone from the Six Apart crew thought this through enough to warn fandom that it was coming, you can be damn sure this conversation happened around some table somewhere. They knew what would happen; they just didn't know how vocal we would be, and how shitty it would look on their part. I suspect they figured it was worth it to get rid of some innocents while fighting some sort of larger foe (one I'm utterly unfamiliar with). They didn't do it with their eyes shut; they decided that you were expendable, fandom.

I suspect they didn't mean to rollover academic communities talking about Nabokov. I suspect they didn't mean to blast incest-survivor groups. But I'm pretty sure they had every intention of packing in communities like pornish_pixies if it would help their image.

So when they talk about the "kind of community" that they want to build, just remember: if you're in fandom writing stuff that might qualify for the communities that got axed, you're probably not their kind of community. Think about that before you give Livejournal any more of your money.

I'm disgusted at the way the purge went down, but I'm more disgusted by the apology. Don't play nice, ladies. They're lying through their teeth.

Lots of love,

Ivy

p.s. I really hope you've all joined fandom_counts by now. If not: what are you waiting for? Off you go, then.

Comments

[pir8fancier.livejournal.com]

I agree with you completely. And I don't mean to sound like a conspiracy nut, but I have a feeling this was a trial run at testing the waters to see if they could bounce the more NC-17 aspects of fandom. It seems to have failed, but I'm not so sanguine. I think this is the first shot over the bow.

Plus, goddamit, couldn't he get someone to edit that? This guy is a CEO and there's grammar mistakes and cross-outs. Looks like the guy is an idiot! You think?

[pieslut.livejournal.com]

There wouldn't be a fandom without the NC-17! Don't they see that?
I'm not saying that every fic is NC-17, or that they should be. I'm saying that porn is what draws people together, and if you remove it, the community will scatter. I'm sorry to alert them to human nature, but gen fic just doesn't bind as well as blowjob fic. It might be much better written, but it's still not gonna do the job.
Christ. I can't believe this. There's even a song! (The Internet is for porn.)

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

I dunno, it depends on what you're in fandom for, I think.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

They just can't be this stupid, not on any level. And it took them waaaaayyy too long to deal, they still haven't satisfactorially explained that gap.

[starlitshore.livejournal.com]

If they really were testing the waters, they could've just looked at what happened to Fanfiction.net when they banned NC-17 rated stories. Everyone left and went elsewhere. If Six Apart doesn't understand that they'd be losing a LOT of business without the power of fandom behind them, they're just idiots. So they can go ahead and try, because I doubt anyone would cry TOO much about going to GJ or JF, etc. as long as the rest of their fandoms went with them. *shrug*

[pir8fancier.livejournal.com]

That didn't hurt ff.net. They are THE largest depository of fanfiction existing. This is why fanlib.com started trolling their "library" for fiction to host on their site.

I think in the long run it will be more important to appease advertisers than people who write NC-17 material. Unfortunately.

[starlitshore.livejournal.com]

Well no. Not now anyway. But back then, they lost quite a few authors and readers, and gained a reputation as a place for crappy fic, right? I guess it doesn't really matter what the rep is, though, if you're big and have ads.

[pieslut.livejournal.com]

Yes.

Not only is the apology itself a load of horseshit, but as of right now it's still totally empty and until pp goes back up, totally worthless.

And even if it goes back up, what the hell. LJ is based on fandom. What were they thinking? If we're not the community they want, what community do they think they have? Unless they want to host blogs for WFI (least.entertaining.read.ever.) I don't really see what the hell they were trying to do.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

I'd like to see the breakdown, frankly. I know lj is huge for fandom, but I wonder just how huge fandom is for lj. I guess we'll be finding out. :/

[treehavn.livejournal.com]

My head hurts. Thanks for this though, I'm just trying to stay on top of who said what where and what it all might mean.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

I spent most of yesterday afternoon reading that graphic novel link you posted, btw.

[treehavn.livejournal.com]

Me too. Whilst at work. And it has nipples in and everything. E gads, some of it was very familiar though. I'm going to email you. Right now.

[nicocoer.livejournal.com]

Precisely. . .

[estriel.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this. I didn't know about the "warning" at all...

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

I really wasn't paying a lot of attention when I saw it, I wish I had. :/

[rainjewel.livejournal.com]

Fuck yes. I've never been one for watching people cover their own asses.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

And yet most of my flist is all happy about that apology. Weird.

[max-ambiguity.livejournal.com]

The part that really rings false is the fact that they didn't warn anyone (officially and at length) before suspending journals. If all they wanted was cleaned up profiles, LJ should have issued a statement that in X days it was going to purge any account with certain interests listed. Such a warning would come with a reminder of their anti-whatever policy. Their legal asses would be covered, and yet the LJ users would have been treated with respect and allowed to either fix their profiles, back up their journals, etc.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

They wanted to rid themselves of certain types of people, it seems to me. I'd really like to ask them point blank what the policy was on communicating (or not) this purge to people. I suspect there was a written policy that said "TELL NO ONE".

[shanaqui]

The obvious problem with this is that if they're genuinely trying to stop paedophiles from using the service by using their interests lists to locate them, warning beforehand would warn those paedophiles and make it harder for them to be found.

The whole idea is flawed in any sense. I'm inclined to take it at face value for now and not let it spoil my enjoyment of the service. I'm certainly going to be more wary, and they aren't going to catch us with our pants down again, but if they're trying to make amends and are genuinely moving to restore communities, which they are, I'm inclined to believe that for now, even if they want to, they won't do anything further.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

Of course, until recently LJ wasn't interested in deleting the journals of pedophiles. Perverted Justice (http://www.perverted-justice.com/index.php?pg=cso) reposted a response they recieved from the abuse team after reporting pedophilia-related journals:

Theoretical, hypothetical, or sociological discussion of illegal activity is not in itself illegal. We can only take action against a user if he or she is posting illegal material, is actively encouraging others to commit illegal actions, or is soliciting or providing information on how to commit illegal activity.

Since that's their stated policy, I'm not certain that they're genuinely trying to stop anyone from doing anything other than making their advertisers look bad.

[storm-maven.livejournal.com]

Did you ever know that you're my heroooooo!

I'm damn sure not stopping my protest. I'm not giving them one more damn dime of my money. I'm going to keep my blog up, but, when my blog is up for renewal, I'm not renewing it. Granted, I wasn't in the firing range to be suspended, but I read a lot of fics that were featured on some of the fan fic communities listed. But to suspend victim sites without even bothering to see what the site was about? That's ridiculous. 6A will loose a lot of money over this. A lot of people have already left, but a lot that are staying are stopping their paid accounts.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

I think we just saw a glimpse of what's going on behind closed doors, and while they can backtrack all the want right now, there's a little bit of truth out there now. I'd be careful.

[maruchina.livejournal.com]

Agreed. I don't trust Six Apart, and IMO LJ has been going downhill ever since it was bought by that company. Once you're dealing with advertisers, the next step is always censorship, as advertisers can state their terms for the content they want to see their adverts associated with. I don't buy into the "wanting to protect the kids" crap for one minute.

I'm not going to renew my paid account when it runs out - and I might be switching over to GJ or journalfen.net, as more and more of my friends are doing. I don't like it at all - I used to love LJ, and I'm sorry the site seems to be going to Hell, especially because I'm really attached to my friends list. :\

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've already mostly bailed on this place anyway, I dunno. If fandom wants to pick up and move, someone should probably organize it so everyone's moving to the same place. :/

[maruchina.livejournal.com]

Hmm...know of anyone who could organize this? Maybe we should make a new community to make people aware?

I guess GreatestJournal would be the best option, as they're offering many of LJ's features, but for free.

[phoenixw.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing, Ivy. I agree, an apology doesn't mean anything if they continue to pursue their "family-friendly environment" policy. LJ hasn't had my money since they decided that women's nipples are indecent, and they're not going to have my little bit of "content" after this. I'm not interested in playing nice, and there are other venues for me to share my words.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

It's not a nice direction they're heading, is it. No nipples (but only women's), and now they're clearly not so keen on the NC-17 fiction, either. It's shaping into a particular perspective, as far as I can tell, and it's not one that's particularly friendly to particular subsets of fanfiction, that's for sure.

[shanaqui]

In fact, what the warning actually said involved fanlib, not Warriors for Innocence. And it claimed the downtime was because of journals being deleted, when in fact it was said to be a Distributed Denial of Service. It claimed to be targeting journals with interests such as "malfoycest" and "wincest" -- during the mess, I went to the communities named "malfoycest" and "wincest", which were still up and running.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'm not yet saying LiveJournal is doing things as you're saying, either.

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

You saw a different warning than I did, because it was through that warning that I first saw Warriors for Innocence mentioned. I don't remember much else about it, except that the interest "incest" was the key target.

[shanaqui]

Interesting. All the ones I saw claimed the attacks were because of fanlib bringing fanfiction into the public eye.

I'm curious: if anyone reading this reposted the warning with the part about WfI in it, could you repost it as a reply to this comment?

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

If anyone reading this reposted the warning, they can certainly link to it here.

I mean, the only other possibility here is that I'm psychic. That might be! Who knows! But I was absolutely warned that this was coming.

[shanaqui]

It's quite possible the message was mangled in being passed around, too.

[starlitshore.livejournal.com]

I can't even express how ridiculous this whole thing is. Some right-wing whackjob (not to say all right-wingers are whackjobs or that all whackjobs are right-wingers, but this one happens to be both) comes trolling along, throws a shitfit and tattles on a few unsuspecting people. BOOM! LJ is all worried about bad press and liability, blah blah blah, and they delete PP. WTF right?

MY question is: Do you think the HP fandom would've reacted this strongly if it hadn't been PP? Say it was a smaller, lesser known comm. I wonder what would've happened. I figure the response would've at least taken longer to spread. So Six Apart really just threw the shit at the fan all on their own. Whups. XD

I'm just so sick of all these debates about free speech and whether or not internet users are entitled to it. OF COURSE WE ARE. *fumes* And when they started throwing around the term "pedo-activists" I was like o.O "So...what? Because I have read Sam/Dean fic, I am suddenly a supporter of child molestation?" I'm not sure how that makes any bloody sense at all.

Anyyyyyway. On a happier note, I didn't know about fandom_counts, but have now joined. I can't believe how many people already have! Upwards of 29000! That is so FAWESOME!

[luciusmalfoy.livejournal.com]

i love you and your moist bits

[ivyblossom.livejournal.com]

o rly.

[kayay.livejournal.com]

But does joining a new community really make a difference? I feel like in the end Livejournal users do not have that much power while it's easy for some group like WIP to make some threats and contact some advertisers* and cause bullcrap like this to happen. There are a lot of us, thus our greatest threat is to say we're leaving and taking our money elsewhere, but it's hard to go. This is where we want to be, where we're comfortable and settled, and where our friends are. So the question is, if SA/LJ pulls something like this again, what will people do? What would you so?



*No solid proof they really are the cause though they claim responsibility (http://catrinella.livejournal.com/151812.html).

[twistedm.livejournal.com]

have you seen:
"User Generated Content" & Ownership: The User as Citizen / http://elements.livejournal.com/11242.html
How Six Apart's Greed Allied Them With Neo-Nazis REVISED / http://stewardess.livejournal.com/261058.html
and/or
Porn, incest, underage, slash--oh, my! / http://cesperanza.livejournal.com/163390.html

?

because i found them all very relevant, interesting, and incisive.