We've got important updates for you this week. As promised, we've made significant changes to Facebook and Twitter Connect integration that respond to your privacy concerns. We're also saying goodbye to an old friend (TxtLJ) and introducing a community moderation enhancement. There's a lot of ground to cover today, so let's get started!
Facebook and Twitter Connect update
We're pleased to announce key changes to the Facebook/Twitter Connection that address your main privacy concerns, as follows:
We've disabled the ability to cross-post comments on privacy-protected entries and screened comments for non-Cyrillic users. If you've opted into Cyrillic services, you'll still be able to cross-post protected and screened comments. (If you recently opted into Cyrillic services to purchase custom userheads, you can opt out and retain your purchased userheads.)
If you haven't added your Twitter or Facebook information to your Account Settings, you will not see the cross-posting checkboxes when posting comments. You will still see the checkboxes when posting an entry, but they will be disabled.
You will no longer see cross-posting checkboxes when you edit a comment.
We've also enhanced the cross-posting feature so you can choose the image that will appear as the thumbnail image on a cross-posted Facebook update. To select an image, click the "Choose a pic" link when you cross-post your entry or your comment to Facebook. If you are cross-posting an entry you are writing, you can select any image that appears within the entry or the userpic you've selected to use. If you are cross-posting a comment, you can only select the userpic you've selected for the comment -- you cannot select images that appear in the entry itself.
Community rejection enhancement
If you're a community maintainer, you can now offer an explanation and/or further instructions whenever you reject a user who requests to join your community (similar to when you reject an entry submitted to a community). Just type in your explanation in the text box before you hit the "Reject" button.
Farewell to TxtLJ
We've discontinued the TxTLJ feature, as the cost of maintaining the service was too high in relation to current usage. We know some of you relied upon this feature for posting, notifications, and more, so we've compiled a list of ways you can accomplish most of the same tasks without it:
Post entries by text message: If you've been texting entries to LiveJournal through TxtLJ, you can still do so as long as you know the email address of your phone (which you can find by contacting your carrier's Help/Support system). Once you know the address, you can list it as an approved sender for your account. Then, all you need to do is send a text message to "yourusername+{PIN}@post.livejournal.com" and it will post as an entry to your journal! For full information on how to set up approved senders and select a PIN, please see this FAQ.
LiveJournal mobile version: You can access the LiveJournal mobile version--m.livejournal.com--to post, comment, and catch up on your Friends page from any smart phone.
Notification options: You can update your notification settings to receive notifications via email, IM, or your LiveJournal Inbox (accessible via m.livejournal.com).
Get messages on the go: Your friends can send you text messages right from your profile page. (Note: You must have a Paid, Plus, or Permanent account in order to enable this feature so your friends can text you.)
There's an app for us!: LiveJournal has official apps for Windows Mobile and iPhone. LiveJournal users have also created apps for various other mobile devices, including Android. Check your device's app store for details.
Did we miss something? We hope you'll let us know in comments.
Other important stuff to know
We've fixed the bug that was impairing the proper function of Pingbacks. It should now be working as intended. Click here to update your Pingback settings. You can read more about Pingbacks in this FAQ.
In response to your requests, we wanted to take some time to answer some of your outstanding questions. Buoyed by your encouragement last week, Meme convinced Frank to go white-water rafting down the Russian River for a while (more details below). Frank will be stopping by the local watering hole to unwind and would love to hear all about your most memorable (i.e., dramatic) aquatic adventure, whether it was whooshing down a water slide, parasailing off a cliff, or falling in a mud puddle. Cry him a river, and he'll float you a boat.
Important stuff to know
Notifications: We've been working hard to resolve notification issues. You may have already noticed an improvement in news notifications. We're reducing announcement notifications by turning off notifications for inactive accounts. This will reduce server loads to ease congested queues. We know many of you are still experiencing delayed or missing notifications, so we want to assure you that repairing our notification system is a top priority.
Purging suspended accounts: We expect to start purging suspended accounts by August. The hold-up is that we're still modifying and testing scripts to ensure that all posts--including comments and community entries--associated with suspended accounts are properly purged. For more technical details on how these purges will work, please see this post. We'll let you know when these purged usernames become available.
EDIT: Purging inactive accounts: One of the benefits of the work we've done to purge suspended accounts is that we will now be able to purge inactive journals and communities too--something you've been requesting for years! A journal is defined as inactive if it has not been logged into for 24 consecutive months and has only one post (i.e., the welcome post). A community is defined as inactive if has not been updated for 24 consecutive months and has only one entry and no comments. Once an account is eligible to be purged for inactivity, the owner will be sent an email to alert them of the inactive status. The owner will then have two weeks to log into the journal or post to their community to prevent it from being deleted. If the owner does not log in or post, the account will be deleted and treated like any other deleted account (the owner will have 30 days to log in and undelete the account to prevent it from being purged). Purging inactive accounts will take place sometime after we've begun purging suspended accounts, probably in late August. Again, you can read technical details about suspended and inactive account purges in this post. We'll be sure to let you know when these purged usernames become available.
TxtLJ update: We want to give you a heads up that we're researching other mobile messaging options that will allow us to extend this feature to our international users. If you're a paid or permanent user, you can read more about it here.
Header design contest
Thanks to all of you for participating in the first round of polls. This week, we'd like to present the finalists for your
voting pleasure. We regret that a couple of entries got lost along the way. We hope you'll resubmit them for inclusion in our next header
contest. We'll begin accepting entries next week. We hope you'll help us decide which header will grace the top of LiveJournal by casting
your ballots here. Polls close on Monday, July 19th, at 3PM,
PDT.
Gulf_Aid_Now charitable vgift
We're delighted to announce that gulf_aid_now has already raised over $3,000 to support clean-up and
wildlife protection in the wake of the oil disaster. They've created a charitable vgift, which will help fund environmental recovery efforts. Priced at $0.99, we'll donate all proceeds to the National Wildlife Foundation's Oil Spill Fund (we'll cover the processing fees). We want to thank you, again, for coming together to make a positive social impact.
The adventures of Frank & Meme
Frank and Meme are taking a short vacation up north to reconnect. When they return, they'll be setting up a cozy new abode. Based on your
feedback, we'll post brief prompts in the newsletter each week and ask you to submit original fanfic to frankandmeme.
We'll be using +1 ratings to choose which entry will continue the narrative (we're thinking, up to 300 words with or without an image).
A very short excerpt and link to the winning submission will be published in news under a cut. All participants will receive 500 LJ tokens, while the
winning author will be awarded 1,000 LJ tokens. Frank and Meme will still give out vgifts to those who comment on the winning post (at their new address). We look forward to hearing further suggestions at frankandmeme.
For our featured photo, we'll catch you under the cut! ( Collapse )
Thanks again for joining us. We'll see you next week!
It's been a momentous 12 months here at LiveJournal. We crossed a capital T at Ten years young. And, like most precocious pubescents, we celebrated turning double digits by publishing our first book! Needless to say, we've experienced some major changes, both inside and out. Before we recap, we'd like to thank you for bearing with us as we've struggled through ungainly growth spurts, identity pangs, and, yes, the occasional blemish. We hope you'll continue to stand by us: We're gaining wisdom with maturity.
Stuff you liked
Back in February, we placed a call for entries for our ten-year anniversary anthology in lj_turns10. In December (less than a year later!), we officially announced the publication of Live Journal: The First Decade. Featuring an inspired collection of writing, photographs, and artwork from the pages of LiveJournal history, the book has been selected by Blurb.com as a top staff pick! We are proud to have played host to so much talent over the years, and we thank our contributors for sharing their extraordinary work.
We all love quirky surprises, but not when it comes to managing our account settings. This year we streamlined settings into one central account management area. No more sifting through FAQs to figure out how to control privacy settings, modify notifications, adjust mobile settings, or update contact information!
Being users ourselves, we realize our own mothers couldn't find us on LiveJournal based on our usernames and userpics alone (*heaves heavy sigh of relief*). But since there are times when we actually want to be found, we created a search tool--Find Your Friends--to help locate people by email address (it's in the Friends drop-down menu).
Spam counter-attack: The war against vicious malware and spambots reigns eternal, but we've been making serious inroads to ensure your online security. We've established new protocols, such as requiring email address validations. We've grown more savvy about ferreting out suspicious behavior. We've added features, like whitelisting, to help you protect your communities. Our valiant (i.e., overworked) spam avengers (a/k/a the LiveJournal ops team) are standing on red alert so you can sleep safely at night.
After an intensive beta, we launched My Guests at the end of the year, which lets you see who's been hanging around your journal. A number of you have even discovered secret admirers (not all of whom are creepy)!
Last, but by no means least, we want to thank our volunteers for providing invaluable support and feedback. Their Herculean efforts enable us to answer your questions more efficiently, identify spammers, reduce abuse, and deliver better features (through tireless testing). On behalf of the staff and the larger LiveJournal community, we are truly grateful for their diligence, intelligence, loyalty, and passion.
You got your fix
We recently debugged a number of the oustanding issues with the rich text editor so your entries look great regardless of whether you know html. You can read more about text editors here.
In response to user demand, we brought back international voice posting. Please note that this still needs more tweaking, and we are working on the one-minute cut-off issue. For more info on voice posting, read here.
At long last, we revived TxtLJ with Verizon. For more info on TxtLJ, check out the FAQ.
Paid features you enjoyed
In December, we introduced My Stats, which provides detailed data on who's been viewing your entries as well as statistics on commenting, RSS requests, friending history, and more. Despite a few early glitches, the response has been extremely favorable.
This year, we launched and improved Notes (i.e., the feature formerly known as Alias), which lets you add private comments on friends and commenters (it's in the Profile drop-down menu). This way you won't be caught red-faced when you strain to remember details about that wonderful LiveJournal friend who sent you a birthday vGift. For more info, read the FAQ.
When we first announced View friends pages by date, we thought it would be a quiet, minor enhancement. The rave reaction floored us, which made us all very happy. We gave it a fine tuning in February of 2009, so it's even better!
How embarrassing! It appears pingbacks have gone back to the shop for service. We’ll keep you posted. We didn't know just much you liked pingbacks until it went in for service. It's back and, judging by your irritation when it wasn't available, this is good news. FYI, pingbacks send instant notifications (via screened comments) whenever someone links to one of your entries on LiveJournal. For more info, read this entry in paidmembers or check out the FAQ.
Mixed reviews
The search is still on. Some of you have reported getting more comprehensive results for keyword searches using the new Yandex search engine and like the ability to search within content categories (like entries or comments). Others have not been satisfied with the relevancy of search results. Please be patient. We're still tweaking this product.
This past December, we wanted to try out a new holiday promotion. Given the crap economy, we decided to offer our Paid/Permanent users a stack of $10 coupons to send to Basic/Plus users for paid account upgrades. We hoped you would like it. And some of you did, but many were disappointed that we didn't offer Give More as well. We want to thank you so much for letting us know. Your input will help us plan better in the future. Just FYI, Paid/Permanent users can continue to send out coupons through January 15th. Coupons can be redeemed through January 31, 2010.
We were pretty excited about Your Journal Your Money, which allows Paid/Permanent users to earn extra cash by displaying Google ads to Basic/Plus and logged out users. A number of you tried it. Some of you really like it. Others, not so much. (Just FYI, Paid/Permanent users who do not participate in this program will not view ads on journals. Participants will see ads on their own journal, but won't see them on other journals unless they specifically opt in.) For additional details, visit here.
We relaunched m.livejournal.com, our mobile app. While it offers a nicer UI and enhanced functionality, some of you think we can do better on load times. Like most of us, it's a work in progress. You can customize your mobile settings here. For more info, please read the FAQ.
Missing Inaction
We shudder to bring up the neon purple elephant squatting on our heads, but, yes, we didn't give you those a la carte userpics. We've been making radical improvements to our backend in order to support them. But no excuses. We know you want them. We cringe every time you mention them. We're sorry we dropped the ball on this, and we promise to do our best to get them to you in 2010.
Stumbling points
Back in early August, we experienced outages related to a series of DDoS attacks. We are proud to report that we were down a total of one hour over the course of a few days. We thank our heroic ops guys for getting us up sooner and more consistently than any of our less fortunate social networking friends. We apologize for leaving you temporarily stranded.
A couple of months back, we offered a free, unrestricted vGift, which induced a snowflake cookie avalanche. This resulted in backed up/delayed notifications, which, in turn, led us to reboot systems, rendering scrapbooks unavailable. It took a while to shovel free. Apologies for the inconvenience. We learned a valuable lesson that should keep us calamity-free in the future (fingers crossed while knocking on wood).
That darn Best Buy ad. First off, we're sorry about the audio auto-play (we got it turned off as quickly as possible). While it's true that we'll continue to show this type of ad to accounts that normally see them (never to Paid/Permanent accounts), we'll make sure the sound defaults to off moving forward. We promise to do our very best to keep ads to a minimum on LiveJournal, while keeping a roof over Frank's head.
Full steam ahead!
As we plunge headfirst into the next decade, we want to take a moment to look back and thank all of our employees, both past and present, who have worked so hard to create our unique and magical universe. We couldn't have made it this far without you: Your contributions brighten our path everyday. We also want to extend our heartfelt appreciation to each and every one of you. Whether you've been around for ten days or ten years, your humor, intelligence, talent, and creativity are what makes this the most vibrant global community on the Internet (the best place on the Web, in our humble opinion). Here's hoping that 2010 will be the greatest year yet! We thank you for joining us as we embark upon another glorious decade of LiveJournal history!
Advisory Board Elections Today, May 22nd, marks the beginning of the Advisory Board Election process. Polls will be open through the 29th. Out of the following list, find the candidate you think is best-suited to provide the kind of input we at LiveJournal can use to better the site:
New V-Gifts Summer's finally here! The season brings warm weather, the spirit of apprecciation, and, naturally, a slew of new v-gifts. If you're looking to celebrate a special friendship, the spirit of theatre or a loved one's graduation, we've got perfect ornaments for the occasion. Take a gander at these fine options and get your celebration on.
L to R: daisy, theatre masks, tiara, diploma, graduation cap
TxtLJ You can use LiveJournal's TxtLJ service to receive text notifications and make posts to your journal with your mobile phone. Give us some feedback on the experience at lj_feedback. What would make TxtLJ more useful? How can we improve the service for you guys?
LJ Dashboard We've cooked up a new utility at LJ Labs, where we're developing a whole host of LJ side projects.
Introducing LJ Dashboard, a portal to the most popular communities, journals and entries on LiveJournal. Now there's a mechanism to help you discover new content and keep track of what's happening out there. Login to the Dashboard using your Open ID, which is exampleusername.livejournal.com. After you're asked to grant identity validation to dashboard.livejournal.com, you'll be all set to poke around and play with some of the things we've come up with.
Since we're launching LJ Dashboard for the first time, we encourage you to post some feedback at lj_labs.
We're currently running some house ads on the Dashboard. Soon ads for external businesses will replace them. But right now all users see the house ads because, for the time being, we don't have a way of distinguishing between paid and unpaid users on the Dashboard. Have no fear: soon as we've got that worked out, paid users will be spared. Thanks for your patience!
We're having a lot of fun with some great ideas right now so keep an eye out for new LJ Labs releases!
