LJ changes

[watervole]

I'm not impressed by the way LJ eliminated new basic accounts while trying to sneak it past us.

I'm even less impressed now I realise some of the knock on effects.

My account is 'paid' at present because some kind person donated me a year's account.   Presumably at the end of the year, instead of reverting back to 'basic' I will now revert to an account with adverts.

I'll bet there' s quite a lot of paid account users who will get caught by that particular trick.  It can be useful to be able to flip between 'paid' and 'basic' depending on your financial status at the time of renewal.

Comments

[drplokta]

No, you'll revert to Basic. It's only new accounts created after 12 March 2008 that can't be at Basic status.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

If that's correct, then I'm much relieved.

However, my account type is currently 'paid'. If that expires, am I creating a 'new' basic account?

[nerosmaster.livejournal.com]

That is correct.
When you change from Paid to Basic you are changing the features available to your existing account, not creating a new account.

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

No you aren't you are just limiting your options on an already existing account, or that's how I read it. LJ might well have a totally different interpretation.

Unfortunately you won't be immune to advertising, I think a free account visiting a sponsored one will see the adverts on the sponsored account, but that will happen only if you go to their account not read their entries on your flist.

[julesjones]

They're saying that any accounts with a userID below a certain number will be grandfathered in, and can revert to Basic if so desired.

There is a certain amount of cynicism about how long it will be before even grandfathered Basic accounts either disappear altogether or have ads applied to them anyway.

I wouldn't actually mind the advertising if it was the sort of advertising Google manages to pull off, i.e. not in your face, and useful when you actually want to look at it. Unfortunately they've gone for the web advertising model which assumes that it's necessary to be as obnoxious and attention-grabbing as possible to force people to look at it.

[veronica-milvus.livejournal.com]

The adverts are not so bad....

[sophiedb.livejournal.com]

I wonder what will happen to Early Adopter accounts - they're still listed in the FAQ as having more features than basic, but as you say: how long?

[drplokta]

No, it's still the same account, even if it stops being paid. You'll be fine.

[raspberryfool.livejournal.com]

If the ads are image-based, i won't be worried because i generally read LJ with images off, so i won't see them. But i think it's a little sad that LJ has morphed into a commercial enterprise. I'm aware it has to cover expenses (staff, hosting etc), but it was never in it for the big bucks. Then maybe i'm naive, but i *do* miss the old internet...

*thinks* maybe i could flog my other basic LJ account... j/k

[vicarage.livejournal.com]

Mine expires in days, and I'm not giving them any more money, so we shall see

[jthijsen.livejournal.com]

I really don't understand what the big deal is. I started with a sponsored account and the ads never bothered me the least little bit. And if they do bother you, you could always install adblockers.

I mean, basically you're unhappy because you're no longer getting a freebie. Well guess what: nobody's obligated to give you freebies, or to keep giving them to you even if they have been doing so in the past. Somebody is doing at least some kind of work to make sure that you can keep using your LJ account. Why wouldn't they be in their rights to ask for at least some kind of compensation for their work?

[watervole.livejournal.com]

I'll await the result with interest.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

As Brad (one of the LJ fourders) put it - all the 'free' pages are actually doing unpaid work generating content for the paid users to read. This was economically viable - they made good money.

What people are mainly objecting to is the way that they introduced the change - they tried to pass it off in the small print as a way of making it easier to set up an account.

As it happens, they've made money from my account thanks to the generosity of my friends, and I probably would have chosen to pay for it myself this year if LJ weren't being so underhanded.

I thought LJ were in the right in the last debate over default icons - this time, I think they've goofed.

[jthijsen.livejournal.com]

So basically you're not protesting the disappearance of the basic accounts, but LJ's bad communication skills in this matter. I guess that for a company that makes its money on the internet, that's a valid point.

However, my original point about freebies still stands. As for you doing unpaid "work": are you thinking of benefiting LJ every time you post to your journal, or do you do it to get in touch with your flist? Because if it's the latter, then demanding compensation is a bit silly. And if it's the first, I think LJ just fired you...

[watervole.livejournal.com]

LJ's communication skills have been getting a lot worse of recent. They aren't even communicating with their own advice panel.

You've slightly missed my point about freebies. Brad's case was that free accounts were an economic benefit to LJ. He wasn't making this point on behalf of the account holders, but as the guy who used to run LJ and made money by having lots of free accounts.

Social networks such as LJ and Facebook have a critical mass factor. People tend to go where their friends are. Achieving that critical mass is necessary if you want to attract the people with money. If you upset too many people, they go elsewhere and their (paying) friends go in order to remain with their community. (It's like running a pub. You upset a group and they decide en masse to change their local)