LJ User Icons

[plonq]

I got a note from LJ the other day advising me that my extra Userpics Package will be expiring in a few days. I do like my extra userpics, and I would love to renew the subscription. The only fly in the renewal ointment is the fact that Livejournal has been down more than up the past few days. I don't recall hearing of any elections in Russia these days, so I'm not sure what their issue is this time around. One of their programmers ran over the dog of a Russian mobster perhaps.

I seem to be spreading myself over a lot of social networks these days (LJ, G+, FB, Twitter, even a Dreamwidth account that I almost never log into...) and I seem to be posting very little to any of them. There have been times recently when I have considered contracting my footprint just a bit and dropping some of the services - then again, other than Livejournal it's not like it costs me anything to be on any of them.

If I did end up dropping off any of the social networks, LJ is about the only one I consider indispensable. It may not be the most reliable, but it is familiar and comfortable, and most of the people I came here to hang out with are still here at some level.

Comments

LJ

[quetico.livejournal.com]

Here here. Lj is a big part on why I got into the famdom. and most of my friends are still here, even though they have found hipper social media.
I think everyone should check into their LJ a couple times a week. I don't post for my own amusement.
But it sure seems that way.

[ionotter.livejournal.com]

LJ was under a truly epic DDoS. So far, the largest recorded in history, from what I've read. The attacks maxed out the backbones for Qwest and Verizon both, at 8 gigabit.

It's still on-going, but they've managed to deflect the incoming packets.

[aerofox.livejournal.com]

I'm still here too. Other than FA, this is about the only other social site i'm using these days.

I suppose I should change that.... but the others just don't fit me well.... or is it I don't fit them well?

[mwalimu.livejournal.com]

I still use LJ and in most respects prefer it over other social sites.

Facebook is my main social networking site for family and other non-furry friends, so I keep the furry stuff low-key, even though I have a few furry fans on my friends list (including you). But it has its problems. I'd like to try Google+ and could end up switching to it, but thus far haven't been able to procure an invite.

I haven't tried Twitter and I'm not really interested. Don't think I could ever get used to a 140 character limit.

FA journals are too cumbersome to use. You have to click on each entry just to see the base entry. I wish they offered something like the friends view on LJ. It would also be nice if you could choose separately whether to follow someone's journals and their gallery.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

They all serve different purposes for me - though Facebook and G+ overlap a lot.

I tend to keep my postings to FB and G+ mostly mundane since those tend to have family and co-workers on them. The granularity of control that G+ allows with the circles is a nice touch though.

Twitter is more whimsical in nature; the 140 character limit stops me from trying to post anything terribly deep or meaningful in there. At the same time, it is fun trying to compress a meaningful thought into those constraints and I find that many of my posts end up using exactly 140 characters.

I'd like to try Google+ and could end up switching to it, but thus far haven't been able to procure an invite.

That's easily rectified - just send me your email address in a private message and I can fire you an invite.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

Facebook is my primary online social contact with old friends and family. G+ seems to serve about the same purpose, but with a bit more granular control, and less of the stupid. I could take or leave either of them.

Twitter is fun, but I doubt I'd find much use out of it if I did not have a smart phone. Also the fact that it's blocked by our corporate firewall made it of limited use to me at work (where I spend most of my time behind a computer). Fortunately addons like Silver Bird and Echofon seem to get around the blocks.

While I don't follow the strip, I think Penny Arcade summed up Twitter the best: Twitter in a nutshell. (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/4/23/)

To my thinking, Twitter is really only useful in near real-time. That's one of the reasons why I unfriended a couple of people here who turned their LJ feeds into a dumping ground for stale tweets. Seeing posts full of things like, "Hey, go outside right now! There's a huge asteroid plummeting to the ground and it looks awesome!" from 12 hours ago, or "@somerandom guy LOL!" just seemed spammy and pointless to me.

Re: LJ

[plonq.livejournal.com]

Even when I seem dormant on here at times, I actually check LJ regularly. Daily when I remember, or at minimum 4 times a week.

I keep promising myself that I will get more active here again, but you've seen how much success I've had with that.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

To me Livejournal is like that old pair of shoes that you just keep hanging onto, even though they leak terribly in the rain and smell kind of funky. You don't wear them as much as you used to because you've got newer, more respectable ones but you can't bear to part with them because they're so comfortable.

[aerofox.livejournal.com]

The more I hear about Facebook, the more I want to avoid that place...
Besides, I have no family to keep in contact with. Nor any friends short of those in furry that are computer literate.

Yes, I have a few friends in antique radio circles, but most of them seem to avoid computers like the plague.

Twitter has been difficult for me. The client I had on my phone sucked large donkey balls, so I switched to Tweetdeck. Then I found out if I haven't looked at it in a while, there is this HUGE line of tweets I must scroll through to get to the current ones at the end! O.O

So, its not been a pleasant experience. After all, isn't this all supposed to be fun?

Re: LJ

[pierrekrahn.livejournal.com]

I never post here anymore, but like you I check at least 4 times a week.

[kfops.livejournal.com]

I found that I use LiveJournal enough to pay for it, and probably will continue for the foreseeable future. I do end up checking it out a few times a day, but I do find my posting rather cyclical. I go through times when I hardly post, and then I sort've ramp it up again.

I did definitely miss LJ during the DDOS attack.

There is some murmuring that if G+ does really take off it my end up being a Twitter replacement/usurper. I do like the idea of "social circles", which makes G+ more intriguing for me... Facebook has just never really done it. I did set-up a Facebook account, and I found that if you're from a small town then everybody considers you their "friend".

This is not my reality!

[aurifer.livejournal.com]

And then the Russians swarm you for a few days so that you can't get to those shoes, but you persevere and still wear them afterwards.


Recent events have pushed me to mirror on Dreamwidth, so I'll have to read two friends pages.
I'll still stick with LJ to the last, though.

[ionotter.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's what all the Russian bloggers are doing. It's no mystery who did this, and the implications of why they're doing it are likewise, no mystery. So everyone is doing backups and creating mirrors, but they're all staying with LJ, because for what it is, it's the biggest, best and most powerful platform out there.

Here's more info on that: http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/web-will-win-in-cyber-war/441377.html#ixzz1Tl2XSVJ4

[ionotter.livejournal.com]

Except those newer, more respectable shoes are only "respectable" because all the sheep are wearing them. And all those sheep are charging headlong into the chute that leads to the branding machine, where they'll be dipped, shorn, tattooed, chipped and impregnated.

But hey? GREAT looking shoes!