State of the Molehill

[autographedcat]

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
--William Butler Yeats

This latest round in LJ Drama makes me profoundly sad.

That is all.

Comments

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Me, too.

[katyhh.livejournal.com]

*hugs* just cuz

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

It doesn't me, and I'll tell you why. This is the first round where I've seen people actually doing stuff about it rather than just whining... putting their code and their hardware where their keyboards are. It'll be pretty darn cool if it works out...

[autographedcat.livejournal.com]

I've got a whole rant on this, but I'm too tired and frustrated and sad about the whole thing right now. But chew on this for a while:

Do you *really* think there's a magical place to set up where you'll be free of this kind of thing? Because there isn't. Even if you build your own site, someone has to host it, and someone has to provide bandwidth, and those companies will have the same kinds of pressures, and the same Acceptable Use Policies.

I'm not trying to be an apologist for 6A; they've done many things that were downright stupid. And there are people who are engaging 6A in a rational and constructive manner, and I hope that 6A is response to them. But the baying for blood and rattling of sabers is wearying, and the mob mentality in a group I expect better of is both frightening and disappointing.

I suppose it has always been the habit of fandom to tilt at ideological windmills, but this seems to have been whipped into a fervor that far outweighs what's really going on. And that makes me sad.

[bedlamhouse]

Hear, hear. Well said.

I feel your frustration and am also experiencing it.

I wait.

[gingicat]

It is the people who are doing something constructive that I'm rooting for. For example, I signed this open letter:
http://bubble-blunder.livejournal.com/82091.html

[bardling.livejournal.com]

Well said. I'm with you on this. *hug*

[telynor.livejournal.com]

I agree.

*smooch*

[poltr1]

Aye.

I'm trying to see both sides of the issue, and I'm getting tired of the flame wars that have been erupting over this.

blissfully unaware

[ketzl.livejournal.com]

What's the issue?

[ailsaek.livejournal.com]

I think I am one of he few people on my flist who really doesn't care. American case law shows that pornographic images or text about underaged participants are actionable whether the participants are real minors or just imaginary. So if a company just doesn't want to go there, I don't see the problem.

The fact that I find pornography about people younger than my daughter repugnant in the extreme doesn't help either, I suppose.

[stevemb.livejournal.com]

The problems aren't with the policies per se (it's their property and they can make rules on how it's run). The problems are with failures to make their policies clear*, enforcement without good-faith efforts to consider the alleged violators' side of the story, and rather unprofessional responses from employees.

*It has been suggested that is related to the fact that if they explicitly modify the Terms of Service, they are required (unded California law, since that's where their corp is set up) to give paid members a refund if they choose to reject the new TOS and leave.

[allisona.livejournal.com]

I agree :(.

I'm trying to be sympathetic and understanding to appropriate sides, but really I'm just fearful we're about to lose a really wonderful on-line community that isn't going to reform as well or better in any other idealized place.

Time will tell.