MORE SENSELESS ACTS OF BLOGGERY

[Via Fuck Yeah Dementia]

And so we’ve reached the ten-year milestone with this weblog.

Not bad for a medium that’s been dead for years. To say nothing of a blogging service everyone said would die horribly after Russians bought it.

So I should maybe say something, but honestly I’m too tired to think of anything clever. And I’ve probably typed it before.

So as usual, thanks for those of you who have stuck with this thing for the last decade, or even in the last year. Broadcasting will continue on this channel.

Meanwhile, here are my station IDs elsewhere on the web:

1. Dreamwidth

2. Facebook

3. Tumblr (for my NSFW stuff).

4. Goodreads

And of course you can catch my half-assed rock band on both Facebook and Soundcloud.

Going nowhere,

This is dF

This blog turned eight years old on Friday. 

Or maybe I should say my blogging activity started eight years ago Friday. "This blog" is a loaded term, seeing as how it comprises two continuous LJ blogs and a parallel Dreamwidth blog.

Anyway, given the state of LJ today, just being here feels like an accomplishment. A lot of people I’ve met here have moved on to Facebook or Dreamwidth or Tumblr, often out of anger. Every time LJ gets a DDoS attack, or introduces a new change, it’s usually the last straw for somebody, and it gets a little quieter. 

I’ve remarked on this in past anniversary posts – usually by explaining why I’m still here. Which typically breaks down to two reasons: (1) the things that are driving people off LJ don’t bother me very much, and (2) it’s been generally quiet here since I started this thing.

Those two reasons are still in play. But so, I admit, is a third reason: inertia. LJ is still my preferred format for posting anything more complicated than a GIF or a quick music video (and I still rely on a lot of those here anyway) – long rants, serials, and other things that don’t work as well on Facebook or G+. Put another way, I need a place to put stuff like that, and if not on LJ, where?

Okay, yes, Dreamwidth, but that’s more or less the same thing, since I can cross-post easily enough. (I’m doing it right now, in fact.)

But I confess I do tend to spend more time on Facebook these days. I’m making more new friends there than I’ve made here in a long time, and interacting with them more. But again, it’s a limited platform.

So I don’t intend to quit LJ/Dreamwidth, if only because I have a need for this kind of format. But I might go ahead and let my paid LJ account lapse.

Meanwhile, for those of you planning to bail on LJ I suppose it’s appropriate to mention where else I can be found at the moment.

1. Dreamwidth


2. Facebook


3. Tumblr (for my NSFW stuff).

Actually I rather like the Tumblr format, and I’d probably move this blog there if it wasn’t for Tumblr being even less reliable than LJ. (You think LJ has outage problems? You should see what happens when Tumblr fails. And they don’t even have the luxury of being able to blame Russian Mafia hackers.)

Anyway, for those of you still around, thanks for tuning in. Broadcasts will continue as normal.

CONSUMER TIP: If you want to friend me on Facebook, be sure to let me know who you are if yr Facebook name is different from yr LJ handle. I don't add people I don't know, and I've let more than a few friend requests lapse because I didn't know that was an LJ person on the line.

Still here,

This is dF

Today completes Year 7 of my career of bloggery.

And also kicks off Year 8.

I’m not sure that I have much to say beyond what I said last year, though I did learn that I’m only capable of doing one proper blog at a time.

"Proper" meaning something like LJ or DW. I can also do FB, Tumblr and G+, but they're relatively low-effort. And I still do more here than I do there.

Other than that, the only other relevant topic is LJ’s DDoS issues, and I’ve already said what I have to say about that.

So here we are. Or what’s left of us. That’s how it is in this thing we call social networking. People come. People go. Either way, I’m happy you came.

On with the bloggery.

In for the long haul,

This is dF

Or, “Why I keep doing this when bloggery is dead.”

Today marks the sixth anniversary of my presence on the LJs (though not this specific blog, which I started in late 2007).

I’m racking my brains trying to think of something clever to say about it. Honestly I’m not coming up with much. One thing I can say is that I’ve learned an important lesson in doing this:

Blogging is a lot like college radio. You do yr show, play yr music and say what’s on yr mind, imagining all the while that yr friends are out there listening and digging it – when in reality most of them don’t even have their radio turned on.

Which is the case with me. Sure, I have 62 followers (which is probably about 5x as many people as used to listen to my radio shows), but most of you are people I’ve met here on LJ. Of all the meatspace friends I’m in contact with, almost none of them read this blog.

This isn’t their fault, of course. I know it’s nothing personal. They have lives, and each life comes with different priorities, some of which are beyond control. Few of them listened to my radio show as well for similar reasons.

Granted, a key difference is that radio is a fixed yet ethereal medium – it goes out into the ether live, at a fixed time, for one broadcast only, never to be heard again unless someone bothers to tape/archive/syndicate it. With blogs, it’s all recorded and time-shiftable – and still most people I know will never see the vast majority of what I post, mainly because they’re not on LJ and never will be. The only way I can reach them is on Facebook – and even there, most of what I post goes unnoticed and/or "unliked" (and that’s due to the fact that I’m competing with a million other posts in their news feed, 80% of them Farmville updates).

Which begs the question: why bother?

The answer – at least for me – is that I do it for the same reason I did college radio: partly for the love of the medium, partly for my own amusement, and partly to keep in practice. And yes, because I'm an opinionated bastard. But I also do it for the few people who do tune in for whatever reason, whether I know them or not.

(I believe the medical term for this is “sheer bloody-mindedness”. I’ll have to check.)

The same applies to comments (or lack thereof). I get very few of them, but it’s really no different from college radio in that respect – hardly anyone ever called in apart from the occasional request, often for songs I had no interest in playing (Skid Row and Warrant were common examples). If anything, the bloggery gets a better response (with the caveat that I don’t have a troll/spam problem, or a lot of psychotic ex-girlfriends/boyfriends/spouses tuning in, as I know other people do).

All of which I mention because I’ve seen other LJers despair from lack of commentary. But for me, it’s like I’m back in the DJ booth broadcasting to the ether. I just assume that yr out there, and yr getting it, even if you don’t phone in.

Which is my meandering way of saying thanks for tuning in, and that broadcasts will continue as normal.

On with the countdown,

This is dF

So I’ve seen some talk on the f-list about Dreamwidth, which – if you don’t know – is a sort of Old School LJ blog site. It was started by two former LJ employees and, as near as I can tell, aims to go back to the original LJ mandate of being a true community site with none of that pesky corporate ownership and advertising that allegedly ruined it for everyone.

I checked it out, and so far it looks nice. It’s not radically different from LJ – in fact, it’s almost identical, and even sports a few improvements, like a much easier filter system for posts about yr personal life. One feature that appeals to me, besides an apparently more liberal attitude towards content, is the ability to import yr entire existing LJ to it. The Google Analytics support isn’t bad either. And it’s more user-friendly for people who want to use a blogging site to promote their professional work (provided it’s in a creative field – so novelists, artists and photographers who don’t want to build a separate commercial site have an option to combine it with their LJ – only not on LJ, if you follow me).

If there’s a downside, it’s that you currently need an invite code for a free account, and a paid account costs about $5 a year more than LJ. I understand the rationale of keeping their growth under control, and I understand that they have to charge a little more to avoid going the ad route. Still, while it’s tempting to set up something there and cross-post to here, paying for two blogs is a bit overkill for me.

The other thing, of course, is that there’s no real reason to move off of LJ at the moment. LJ has its issues, but so far none of them have been an inconvenience to me personally. And maybe it’s because I cover the Internet for a living, but the social networking space is clogged with wannabe companies that want to be the next Facebook or Twitter. When competition is fierce in a medium where it’s easier to get VC funding than it is to actually make money, few survive. Dreamwidth might, but they’ve only been in beta for five days, so it’s hard to tell.

Personally, I’m in no hurry. If nothing else, I think I’ll wait until all the cybersquatting yahoos have had their fun before I commit to it. If any of you who have already set up accounts there can make a really good case for Dreamwidth, I’m all ears.

Invite codes are also welcome. :)

Meanwhile, the official Team Def blog will stay here on LJ at least until 70% of you head off to Dreamwidth.

Of course, this would be the ideal time to start that sex blog I’ve always wanted ... because God knows there aren’t enough of THOSE on the Internet ...

Don’t dream it, be it,

This is dF

Wow. Apparently Warren Ellis ran my picture in his World Wide Week series of pictures of his followers.

Granted, all you have to do to qualify is just email him a pic to warrenellis@gmail.com, which I did. Still, it’s an honor of sorts to have a pic I snapped off my cell phone included with pics by people who are actually creative.

Some of you should have no trouble figuring out which one is me. For the rest of you, have fun. Hint: I’m the soft one.

Almost famous,

This is dF

You may not be able to tell from yr Friends page – which means this is all probably $19.95 down the drain for no reason at all – but as of yesterday, this blog is officially bought and paid for by Russians Team Def International.

For the next 12 months, anyway.

Why wait til April 1st? Because that’s how my sense of humor works. And because the paid account of my abandoned blog expires this Saturday.

I almost considered staying with the Basic account, if only because they’ve been discontinued. But as I’ve said before, I don’t mind giving LJ my money in exchange for establishing my little personalized corner of the metaverse where I can howl and shake my voodoo stick at you people all day. Plus, it’ll be nice to be able to post from the mobile phone again. And, for those of you with Plus accounts, I don’t have to look at yr ads for urinary tract infections anymore.

Besides, six user pics is not sufficient. Yes. Must have MORE! This is INTERNET 2008! User pics are the new cash!

Hmm. Yes. Well, anyway, here’s hoping LJ doesn’t make me regret it with some silly random DOJ-suck-ass censorship policy like they have over on the Yahoos, or selling itself to some Nigerian spam farm. Or that I don’t blow it by mindlessly endangering national security again.

Money changes everything,

This is dF

Well, I was going to tell you how I spent my second-favorite national holiday yesterday, but then it dawned on me that today marks my third anniversary here on the LJs.

Wow. I feel just like John Persinger.



Or at least I would if we had a Hooters in Hong Kong. Which we don’t. Which may be why our teens only rank 9th out of 11 on the Asia Happiness Chart. Or not. We do have a Fatburger, but it's just not the same.

Anyway, it’s been a good run, apart from The Corporate Faux Pas Incident that forced me to abandon my paid blog in favor of this one – which, you’ll notice, is ad-free. And as popfiend (by way of interactiveleaf) has reminded us, those days are now over. If you want a new account here, you’ll pay for it, or you’ll accept advertising and like it.

There’s been some grumbling, but there’s always grumbling in communities, online or off, when corporate strangers take over the place and decide they’re going to Make A Few Changes Around Here. Which is understandable, and justified in lots of cases. In the case of LJ, I’m not that precious about it – partly because it’s more drama than I really need in my life, and partly because I have enough insider knowledge of the IT industry to understand why the New Owners don’t want to subsidize any more new freeloaders. Plus, I intend to upgrade this account to Paid once the old one expires in a couple of weeks anyway.

The other thing is that I get something different out of LJ than a lot of people. For me, it’s a shingle for me to howl at the moon and pass on things to friends that I think will amuse them, or tell them something they might not have heard yet, or just to keep developing my writing style. It’s a mind-dump, basically. Which, ironically, is probably why most of the people I’m writing this for never ever read it. As far as I know. But I do it anyway. The moon, it listens to me. As do most of the people who have been kind enough to put me on their Friends list. Or at least they put up with it, which is as much as anyone can ask for these days.

All of this is my usual long-winded way of saying that I’ll be on the LJ for as long as they’ll have me. The company’s changed ownership twice since I signed on, and the only time I ever seriously considered leaving was the Indiscriminate Censorship Incident, which was well-intentioned but badly handled. And probably inevitable, given how just about any service provider on the Interwubs is facing even more pressure from the govt who, if they had their way, would hold websites and ISPs 100% responsible for anything anyone does or says on their networks, and hand over user info on demand for any reason whatsoever. Few Web 2.0 executives would have the mettle or the financial resources to fight it. Not when they have businesses to run.

The bottom line is this: I stay here because LJ’s Terms & Conditions pretty much allow me to say and link what I want. That’s all I require at the moment. The moment I’m told, “You can’t say that,” I’ll take my business elsewhere.

Or is this too heavy for an anniversary post?

Oh, all right, have another John Persinger birthday pic.



Blogging for the future,

This is dF

And now, from the same people who enabled the previous meme, here’s a summary of this blog so far – in a photo format. (And roughly as safe for work as the last one – which is to say, not very.)


Some of it is, of course, news to me. I honestly have no idea who some of these people are. Anyway, expect Christmas to be a recurring theme.

WARNING: Contains Ryan Seacrest. (See? I had no idea I’d written a word about him.)

Take a pretty picture,

This is dF