FYI: LJ trying to be sneaky and failing spectacularly

[lyl_devil]

So, first there was the unannounced removal of Basic journals. The big kerfuffle over this was not that they removed them (even though when SixApart bought LJ they specifically said they wouldn't), but about the fact that it wasn't mentioned. The same day they got rid of them was the same day SA did the big '100 days' post in news, yet not a word about losing Basic accounts was mentioned.

They have since apologized...sort of . I think. Someone posted a big 'wow, you guys are loud' post in news but didn't actually say anything useful. Or, you know, at all.

Next, it was the discovery that the popular interests page was being censored for 'hot topic' words like sex, boys, bondage and fanfiction. And depression, which is right up there with fanfiction for the stupid interests to censor.

This has since been fixed, mostly. I think.

The latest one - LJ is grabbing personal data on you through the Plus accounts. Go here and see how it's LJ's very own version of BEACON, and we've all been affected.
ETA: The post in question has gone to friends only (of which I am not one). I can try and remember what command to use in the admin console to limit the damage, but you might be better off googling it.
From the post:

...anytime you visit an LJ page with ads on it, your gender, birth date, country, 10 most popular interests and the content of your first public post are sent to an ad-targeting server. If none of those things are available, the server starts scanning the public content of your journal. You don't even have to have a Plus account for this to happen; if you've ever visited an LJ page with ads on it, or even have someone with a Plus account on your f-list, they've done this to you already.

The post details how you can limit the information shown, but that's about it. There's nothing you can do about it, unless you defriend every Plus account and never visit any in the future. Though, now that they've gotten rid of Basic accounts, that's going to be harder and harder to do.

Personally, I'm annoyed by all this, though it's mostly the lack of communication (which they still don't comprehend, even after all the events of last year) and the data they collect on me. Plus accounts have never bothered me, but that's because I have Ad Blocker Plus and NoScript, which hides ads before I even realize they're there. I honestly don't know what an LJ with advertising looks like, and I'm glad.

I'm also considering not friending any one who has a Plus account, and making a special flist filter that doesn't have any of them, either. I don't know if maybe that's going too far, but tough. I don't want Google knowing what sites I search for, and I don't want LJ to know my birthday or where I was born. I'm very careful about what personal information I make public, and the only reason I did that on LJ was because I understood that the only people who would use that data was either LJ - for internal statistics(maybe) - and people on my flist or people who want to join my flist.

In no way, shape or form did I agree to having it sit on some advertising server just waiting for a marketing monkey to use it to tell me what I want to buy next.

Comments

[humbuggirl.livejournal.com]

The latest one - LJ is grabbing personal data on you through the Plus accounts.

OMG! That explains so much! I do a virus scan on my computer every couple of days and recently it's been bringing up a 'low risk' tracking cookie every time that I do it. I wondered where the hell it was coming from.

ETA: The link you give to the place where you found the info comes up with a 403 forbidden page... don't know whether it's just me, lol.

[lyl-devil.livejournal.com]

No, the link got locked down about 5 minutes after I posted. I'll see if it becomes open again.

And yeah - I noticed a few tracking cookies this weekend, when I haven't had any for the past few months. I didn't bother to figure out where they came from, I just deleted them.

[kallie-kat.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's just....sleazy doesn't even begin to cover it. I guess I'm glad now that I lied about my birth date, but the rest of that information...that's so not cool. You give a company information about you and trust them to abide by the rules of their privacy policies. Then, when they think nobody's looking, their policies change.

Frankly, I think the damage has been done. I'm not going to do anything about Plus accounts because it just seems too cumbersome, and since I'm constantly clicking around from journal to journal, it just doesn't make sense. But I have to admit that I'm disgusted by the actions of LJ and 6A. I used to think they were better than this.

[lyl-devil.livejournal.com]

Actually, 6A sold LJ to SUP (no idea what that stands for), and LJ has now become LiveJournal Inc. That's what the whole '100 day plan' was about - changes made in the first 100 days of new ownership.

I think in addition to this whole 'compiling private data' thing, is the lack of communication LJ continues to promote. After the events of Strikethrough 2007, you'd think they would have wised up, but time and time again they keep ignoring their customer base.

The personal data is just the latest in a long line of broken promises from LJ.

[kallie-kat.livejournal.com]

That's right--I knew they'd sold, but couldn't remember to whom.

Frankly, I don't think they care at all about their customer base. Their continued lack of communication makes me think that their attitude is "screw 'em. We've got their money. We'll continue to shape this product as we want it, and anyone who doesn't like it can go somewhere else."

Of course, there is nowhere else. Oh, there's insanejournal, and a couple of other journaling sites, but in order to get the communities and the amount of interaction we've all grown accustomed to, most people are going to stay right where they are, for now, at least.

My prediction is that LJ will continue their current business practices, and eventually the balance will shift in insanejournal's direction. More people will be there than at LJ, and once that happens it'll be like a mass exodus. Fandom-wise, at least. I'm sure that there are a lot of people on LJ that don't give a hoot about what LJ is doing.

Okay, rant time over. Back to work :-(