Paid account or not paid account?

[watervole]

Time for my annual rumination - to renew a paid account or not to renew a paid account...

Polls are nice, so are extra userpics (although you get half a dozen with the basic account now), but are there enough things I'd miss to make it worth the cost?  Tricky.  I suspect it's possible to get so used to a feature that you forget it isn't a basic one.  I know there are a lot of 'paid' features that I don't use.

There are also features that I've no idea how to access.  I've noticed that one of the journals I read has a tag menu down the side - with the most frequently used tags in  larger fonts.  Can anyone tell me how to do this?

Comments

[cdybedahl.livejournal.com]

One thing a paid account gets you that you tend to forget about is prioritized access to the LJ webservers. That is, LJ pages will load faster if you're logged in with a paid account.

[oreouk.livejournal.com]

As a comment to this from someone who does not have a paid account, I haven't ever felt I was waiting an excessively long time for LJ pages to download (apart from the DDS thing recently) so wouldn't have thought in itself that it's worth paying for.

I do feel the slowness a little when I'm posting and not just reading, but never enough that I've wished for a way to speed it up.

[alex-holden.livejournal.com]

I think custom display layouts are still a paid feature - that's why I eventually upgraded mine, because I wanted to use a layout that displayed my tags down the side.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Which layouts use tags in that way?

[alex-holden.livejournal.com]

I don't know; the one mine is based on is called Bloggish/Minimalist but it doesn't have the variable size tags feature (clouds?) and I modified it a bit anyway.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

. I've noticed that one of the journals I read has a tag menu down the side - with the most frequently used tags in larger fonts. Can anyone tell me how to do this? It's built into some of the layouts available (mine has it, and I could choose between the 'cloud', I think it's called, and just a straight list of tags as I have).

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Which layout do you use? I really don't want to trigger the RSI by looking at them all.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

It's called Smooth Sailing, and is hugely adaptable and changeable...

[(Anonymous)]

If you go unpaid you will have adverts at least on the login page. They aren't too obtrusive, I see them when I look at my lj in work as I don't keep it permanently logged on here. As a paid account myself, my thanks again to whoever paid it for me,I don't know what these would be like on the lj its self or even if there are any.

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

Sorry the prevous anon was me, I forgot to log in.
If you go unpaid you will have adverts at least on the login page. They aren't too obtrusive, I see them when I look at my lj in work as I don't keep it permanently logged on here. As a paid account myself, my thanks again to whoever paid it for me,I don't know what these would be like on the lj its self or even if there are any.

[oreouk.livejournal.com]

Not entirely true - you get the ads if you want the advantages of a paid account but without paying for it (I'm sure there's a name for that type of account but as I don't have one I don't know it off the top of my head). A basic unpaid account with the 5 or 6 icons and a limited range of styling options is also advertising free. Unless they've changed the rules so only old timers who already have ad free LJs can get ad free LJs, which possibility I do not rule out.

[metamorphosa.livejournal.com]

you get the ads if you want the advantages of a paid account but without paying for it (I'm sure there's a name for that type of account but as I don't have one I don't know it off the top of my head).

I think that's a Plus Account. But I could be wrong.

I have a paid account, and I still get adverts on the login page :(

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

I know the account you mean but can't think of its name either. I know I didn't have adds on my free account but I can't remember if I went paid before or after the ads came in. However lj is a law unto its self when it comes to changing things and not tell its users.

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

On a free account that isn't a advertising one, you get no adverts on any pages except the pages of people who are on the advertising account.

On a paid account, you get no adverts at all - same for permanent accounts.

Everybody gets ads on the login page if they aren't logged in.

[quasi-hayley.livejournal.com]

My layout has a tag cloud and it's called Expressive which is only available to paid users. There's a free equivalent called Mixit but that has less options and I'm not sure whether it has tag clouds or not.

[vicarage.livejournal.com]

I pay, not because I use the features, but because I use the system a lot, and it seems morally right to pay for it.

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

You can make do with six icons? :) I pay for LJ because I use the service and I use some of the features and I get a cool little thumbsup next to my name in the userinfo. Oh, and some stuff on my layout that used to be paid-only but I don't know if it still is.