(no subject)

[rivka]

What attracted me to LJ was the idea of writing about anything that interests me at the moment, without worrying about whether it's interesting to other people or appropriate to a particular locale. It's true that I'm aware of my audience - at first I tried not to have one, by not telling anyone I was keeping an online journal - but it's also true that I feel freed by the opt-in nature of LJ. If you're not interested in what I write, why are you reading my journal?, I ask my inner critic when it accuses me of being boring or precious or self-involved. And my inner critic has to shut up.

It occurs to me that while this is a feature to me, a LJ writer, to many LJ readers it's probably something more like a bug.

This post brought to you by a debate in alt.polyamory.

Comments

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

I just read your journal for the squirrel. It's not wearing anything under that cape, right?

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

I really like you, and I like the way you say things, and I'd want to read your journal even if it were just self-indulgence and tripe. And it isn't.

[kightp.livejournal.com]

*big ol' nod*

LJ isn't a newsgroup isn't a mailing list isn't e-mail isn't chat.

I use all of these (well, not chat; it's not my cuppa) for different reasons, only some of which fall into the "keeping in touch with friends" category. Although what drew me to LJ in the first place was, admittedly, the presence of some good friends I don't much "see" elsewhere any more.

Now that I'm here, I find it an interesting hybrid between a "real" (i.e., paper) journal and a conversation with friends. It doesn't replace the other forums I frequent, it adds to them - for me, anyway, and that's really what counts.

The opt in nature of LJ

[anisoptera.livejournal.com]

It is a feature for me as well.

I also use it to keep track of stuff happening to me as well a way to let friends know what's up with me.

I find LJ easier to deal with then newsgroups. alt.c and alt.poly get overwhelming often.

Re: The opt in nature of LJ

[wcg.livejournal.com]

What she said.

I just do not have the time to read through the newsgroups these days. Oh, I might pull them up to look for specific people, but even then I won't read all the posts by my more loquacious friends. Here, I can look at the friends page once or twice a day, and that lets me know if something's going on with a bunch of people. If there's something that specifically touches on me, I know I'll probably get e-mail about it, or a phone call, or somesuch. But here I can keep a finger on the pulse

[kiya]

I got started in significant part because I wanted to be able to have people at some distance from me able to feel involved with my life and the random pointless stuff that goes on in my day without me sitting down and writing long treatises about the randomness of, "Hey, I'm doing laundry today!" and the like and send it directly -- there's a certain amount of, "If it's sent directly there's a certain amount of request-to-say-something-back involved", and that sort of obligation-weight was causing stress, so we're giving this way of going at things a whirl.

The facts that it also gives me a space to rant about random things and have some potential for feedback and lets me keep track of friends (I discovered the journals of some friends of mine, and I'm getting the blow-by-blow of their pregnancy now, for example) are mostly bonus.

[avram]

I'm reading your journal because I noticed you in my Friend Of list, and I was wondering if you were someone I knew from meatspace (or at least other parts of cyberspace).

Re:

[rivka.livejournal.com]

We've never met in meatspace, but I'm on rasseff. I go by "Rivka W" there.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

She's a Squirrel of Mystery. She wouldn't come right out and tell you whether she's wearing anything under the cape - why waste all of that delicious tension? Instead, you'll just have to keep coming around... hoping... until all other thoughts are driven from your mind by the glory that is the Squirrel.

We've lost six or seven people that way already this week.

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Awwww. Thanks, Mary. It's a pity you live all the way out on that other coast. Is it time for ap9 yet?

[redbird]

It's a feature. I can and do write posts that start with "nothing to see here" when I don't think anyone will be interested. And the reader can then skip, or go on. This isn't an in-person conversation: if someone decides partway through an entry that they don't want to read more about X, they can just skip, without my even knowing it, let alone being irritated.

I write what I want, where I want. Little of it is hidden. But that doesn't mean everyone has the right to have it in the form they find most convenient.

Of course, you know I'd say that, because you've seen me comment on this over in alt.poly. Where I have thus far resisted the urge to point out to Aahz that I might equally well say that he is depriving the denizens of rassef, where he no longer posts, of his input.

Jo, who is a close friend and oddly squicked by online journals, does get email that covers some of the same stuff I put here. But that's my choice--she hasn't demanded it, only mentioned that she doesn't read LJ.

why I read

[starstraf.livejournal.com]

I found you thru a friends of friends looking and read a few entries and figured you were a kewl person. We might have met at a APC. Also we are very likely moving to DC/Baltimore area once sweetie finishes the dissertation so I figured reading your journal would give me some idea of that region.

Hey I loaded up some of my own pictures on jigzone
http://www.jigzone.com/ms/g.php?ua=269731a85763