i am closing my LJ down

[piranha]

my paid LJ account runs out today.

i've pulled all my images off scrapbook, and have privatized all my entries before november 13. in a couple of days i will privatize the remaining ones as well, and i will no longer crosspost; i don't want my content to be used to display advertising.

for now i will continue to use my LJ account to comment, so nobody needs to make access changes at this time; though you can safely remove my LJ if you're reading me in some other way.

if you are not on dreamwidth, and you want to continue to read my entries and comment, you have several choices:

1. get a dreamwidth account. i have free invites; just ask.
   
2. use your LJ openID to establish a reading account on dreamwidth (instructions), and subscribe to me.
   
3. friend the RSS feed of my dreamwidth account on LJ: piranha_dw_feed. RSS feeds are not reliable on LJ at this time; they can cut out for days without notice. also, i am not releasing anything but the title into the feed (see "don't want my content used for ads"); you'll have to click to see the entry. i will not read comments on that feed.
   
4. as yvi just reminded me, you can of course also read my RSS or atom feed in any non-LJ feed reader. grab the RSS or the atom feed URL.
   
5. for the time being, you can also comment anonymously (though please sign), so you don't need an account anywhere. all my entries will be public (with the possible exception of surprises for somebody), ergo there's generally no problem with access. i am, however, screening anon comments, so there will be a delay until yours appears.
   

i know this will be inconvenient for some of you, but it's less effort than following somebody on blogger or wordpress or their own site, and i do that for oodles of people. if it's too much effort for you, then be well; maybe we run across each other in another net incarnation some other time. i will not auto-remove anyone who does no longer read me, but the next time i have an energy crunch, people who don't interact with me will likely drop off the radar. anyway, no hard feelings.

Comments

[yvi]

i've pulled all my images off scrapbook

You are so much smarter than I am - I thought I had at least two months for that and had them deleted by the time I got to it. A notification would have been very nice...

Oh, and your friends can also follow your feed with an RSS reader (Google reader etc.). Much more reliable than feeds on LJ.

[piranha]

*ack*! i thought vaguely too that there was some delay, but since i am untrustful of LJ now i didn't want to take a chance. maybe there once was a delay? probably during brad's time.

it sucks that all yours were deleted! hopefully you had copies? i do, but it would have been hell to restore from those because of LJs unique naming.

thanks for the reminder about RSS readers; i've edited the post to include that.

[yvi]

There is a delay of a week for them still showing up and then every week, something changes, I think? After 30 days they are deleted. I was putting it off because navigating Scrapbook is a nightmare and so then they were gone. I asked denise for a better back-up option for Dreamwidth's implementation :)

I am sure I have copies somewhere on some external harddrives. At least of the most recent...

[(Anonymous)]

I'm sorry to see the end of your crossposts to LJ. I'll miss you. Be well.

(This is my first and probably last visit to DW. I'm just stubborn that way.)

-- Janet

[piranha]

thanks for overcoming your stubbornness enough to tell me. :)

(though i am not sure what you're stubborn about -- you're too stubborn to add an RSS feed? why? i don't recall ever hearing you say. and of course you needn't say now either. i just have no clue.)

[janetmiles]

I'll continue to follow you through the RSS feed. Thanks for the heads-up!

[pixel]

Out of curiosity (since I'll probably be doing some re-arranging of things once my paid LJ is up) are you still reading on LJ? Do you plan to keep doing that indefinitely? (I was hoping I'd be able to switch and read everything on DW at some point but that seems up in the air.)

[piranha]

at this time, yes, but i am slowly moving everything over here. i need to check where we are with the plan to read LJ from over here; what i'll do will depend on that.

[pixel]

Hmm, ok, yeah haven't heard much in a while and wonder if that means it's become not particularly feasible. Thanks!

[maize]

I'm curious: Why do you follow people's blogger or wordpress blogs on their own site rather than dealing with them through some form of RSS reading? (I still read on LJ, so I just make syndicated feeds of all my friends' blogs on livejournal and put them in the spots I'd had those people's LJ accounts.)

I've switched in the other direction -- I've stopped posting to DW in favour of LJ. I still read on both. Do you either still read on both or have some plan to follow the people who only post on LJ using some importey means? I ask mostly because I don't mind reading you here, but I always feel weirdly stalkerey if I'm reading someone and they're not also at least ostensibly reading my journal in return, especially if it's a personal journal rather than a famous-person's-journal-for-fandom's-enjoyment.

[piranha]

i use a mixture -- there are a few people i read daily, and i read those through RSS reading. but there are others i read in spurts, and i prefer to do so one site at a time. there are also people who password-protect their posts. lastly there are actually still people who have no RSS feed, because they rolled their own journalling system and didn't care about RSS.

i'll still be reading on LJ for now, because of the friends lock problem, though i'll be looking at what DW's plans are for allowing LJ reading directly from DW, and hope that happens soon.

[eub.livejournal.com]

I hope some cross-auth system works, so you can read f'locked posts from DW. (In the Me Me Me Dept.: I am posting a significant fraction of LJ posts f-locked, and I'd like them to be available for your reading.)

Congratulations on shedding a burden. Revolutions can be tough.

[piranha]

yeah, no worries. for now i am continuing to read through LJ, and don't feel particularly annoyed by it. i think the biggest thing was to have my content where i didn't feel i had good control over it once i stopped paying, which was different from what i got promised when i started paying.

since just about everyone i read who makes locked posts has a paid account, i'm not assaulted by ads, so it's ok.

[erik]

I'm probably about 6 months behind you; my LJ friends are a lot more hidebound, I guess. My next step will be to continue crossposting content, but change the suggestion to comment here to disabling comments on the LJ and pointing people here.

[piranha]

oh, most of my LJ flist didn't move. i've just decided that letting that hold me sorta hostage wasn't in my best interest. philosophically it really bothers me that i have stayed in a place i disliked for as long as i have, just because other people stayed there.

if people don't bother to continue following me, they're not enough of a friend for me to worry about it. it's not like i am asking for a huge personal effort.

your plan is good. i sorta did that, but with less preparation; time got away from me.

[jackalibis]

I've still got five months remaining on my paid LJ time, but I've already been working on trying to encourage people to come over to DW. I actually regret having spent the money on LJ, because the very day that I did, someone sent me a DW invitation (if only they'd done so just a few minutes sooner...).

Some of my friends are being outright stubborn, and I've just been gearing myself to saying goodbye to them if they want to stay on LJ. I've spent too much time accommodating for everyone, doing crossposts to LJ and InsaneJournal both. I don't mind to IJ so much, but I don't see a lot of comments from either site anymore anyway, so I'm just going to work down until there's no more crossposting. LJ and IJ both have been on the fritz when it comes to email notification of comments, so I don't know that I have comments unless by some fluke I go over and check something out there.

There's a few LJ communities that I watch that are basically personal post journals (like writing blogs or such). That's about it anymore. And since I have a paid account here, I'll probably just create feeds for them to be able to watch here instead of having to go watch on LJ. I've actually had more trouble with LJ since I purchased a paid account than when I had a free account. It's just pissed me off in the end.

And thanks for mentioning about the scrapbook! I hadn't even thought about needing to clean that out before my time runs out. I went ahead and did that now, because I haven't used it since I started blogging here.

[piranha]

yeah, i sort of ran out of patience myself, though i don't blame people for not wanting to move. they don't care about the politics of the place, they just care that they're all set up there, and don't want to go through the hassle of starting out in a new place.

it's actually a really good illustration of why we don't have more revolutions. *wry grin*.

but i definitely feel like i've accomodated them for a long time, and really, too long -- i feel really good today, lighter, relieved, more than i expected; which means staying to LJ for the sake of others bugged me subconsciously more than i realized.

the scrapbook was the biggest deterrent to my move because there is no easy way to change all my old posts; i'll have to do that manually. it'll be a lot of work, and i am not sure i really want to undertake it -- but i do want to make my last 2 years of photos available for printing; people asked about it often enough. so i have to go through them anyway and upload high resolution versions.

[pameladean]

I have a Dreamwidth account, but haven't posted anything there yet and haven't managed to get into the habit of checking my reading list, either. Frankly, even though DW seems a much more sensible affair than many of the other places LJers have flocked to, I don't really feel confident that people are going to stay put yet.

I've subscribbed to the RSS feed for your DW journal, and when I notice I haven't seen anything from you for a while I'll pop over to DW and catch up.

P.

[piranha]

sounds good! i'll still be reading you anyway, so we won't get out of touch.

[gchick]

Interesting observations -- I still have a couple of months of paid LJ time, and I've decided not to renew it, but I haven't really ever thought of pulling up stakes. Too much time and memory, too many dear friends, even though I have no affection left for the service itself.

[piranha]

yeah, the ties that bind. :) i've never felt that attached to LJ; i went grudgingly because a lot of old usenet pals were setting up house there. i tried to get involved with volunteering, but the politics around that on LJ were just going bad, so it ended negatively. i didn't make friends like i made on usenet. here, i made the decision to move myself, and got involved with volunteering right away, and i feel this place represents what i stand for -- and i like to put my money and effort into such endeavours rather than the status quo.

i don't blame anyone for not feeling the same way. but i am feeling really "light" today, relieved, more than i expected.

I'll take one ....

[crazed-lynn.livejournal.com]

of those account codes. I'm done with LJ, too.

-Lynn

Re: I'll take one ....

[piranha]

what's the best email address for you these days?

Re: I'll take one ....

[piranha]

invite sent. hope you like it here!

[(Anonymous)]

I shall miss you on LJ. I will be most certainly find you ifwhen I do migrate here.

leiacat

[piranha]

i'll still be reading you, so we probably won't fall entirely out of touch.

[green_knight]

My plans to crosspost to DW have just hit the snag that my client doesn't yet support custom groups, so I'll have to either add those posts by hand for people who read only on DW, or leave them on LJ for now. And right this moment, due to time constraints, I choose option b.

Other than that, I've started to add icons, and already feel a lot more at home - for me, icons are a way of expressing myself. (The person who gifted me with a paid account utterly, utterly rocks!) I'd planned to be further ahead with the whole setting up and tweaking but, well, life intervened, as life does. I've just started to switch some of my reading to DW, and intend to get into the habit. I have a permanent account on LJ, so no rush to move away, but I can see it happening, and I can see the tipping point coming sooner rather than later.

[piranha]

yeah, i can see not fully moving because not everything is supported yet.

yay, icons! :)

[(Anonymous)]

Have you had an RSS feed on DW all this time? Aargh! I read everything via RSS, with the exception of you and about three other people. I would have added you to my feed yonks ago if I'd known.

Can't sign in with my lj account or TypeKey...

meg
(the one at xom.blogs.com/xoom)

[piranha]

yes -- all DW and all LJ accounts have RSS feeds, unlike blogger one doesn't need to do anything to activate them. on DW one can also control how much of one's entries one wants the feed to show.

sorry! it never occurred to me to mention it!

wonder why you can't sign in with your LJ account.