Dept. of LJ

[kaffy_r]

Any Thoughts on the New Live Journal User Agreement?

Right now it looks as if I can't sign in unless I click "agree" - or more accurately, as if I'll be signed out if I don't click "agree." And from what little I can make out of the new agreement, it's looking less and less like I actually would want to click "agree." Still, perhaps it's not as dire as it seems? I'd love to be pointed to anyone's review of the new agreement (which, per the notice, doesn't appear to be binding in English. When you're redirected to what is referred to as the binding agreement, you discover it's in Russian Cyrillic.) Does anyone have more information that I can view while signed out? Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

ETA: AAAAAnd I can't crosspost unless I click "agree." So there's that.

ETA 2: I signed the agreement so that I could fully access my own account. However I will probably post an announcement letting people know that as of a date certain (possibly April 30), I'll be importing everything from LJ and deleting that account. If folks want to stay in touch, I'll provide an email account, and I'll also urge folks to sign up for, at the very least, a free Dreamwidth account. Any comments I may have made on other peoples' LJ, any deathless prose that the world might lose forever when I disappear ... will, well, be lost 

ETA 3: Reasons for my proposed plan of action? 

For one thing, the English translation isn't trustworthy, by TPTB's own admission; they state that the only "valid" agreement is one that's in Cyrillic Russion. For another, it appears to contradict itself on whether the new Russian Federation laws apply only to people with free accounts or to people with paid accounts (now rechristened Professional Services Packages). 

For yet another, it doesn't make clear the difference between the entity that owns the entire blogging platform, which is now under Russian Federation law, and the entity that supposedly will handle paid users accounts, still referred to as Live Journal Inc. I suspect there's really no difference. 

And another problem? If you read through the non-official English version of the user agreement one thing becomes clear: they state they can censor anyone's journal for political activity or for things that the Russian Federation considers 18+/stuff. Such as anything that mentions the very existence of gay people as, you know, people. 

I know a number of people have pointed out that those laws will probably only be applied to Russian bloggers. A) Just because I'm not affected doesn't make it any more palatable to me, and I'm not interested in even passively supporting the censorship of other people. B) "probably" is a weasel word in these circumstances. 

I think this is the last straw for me. It's a shame, but not a tremendous one. I've been slowly moving over to Dreamwidth anyhow. 

. 

Comments

[matrixmann]

Waited to see somebody say something about this...

Well, on one hand it came out of the blue, but on another hand, when servers move to Russia, it's a self-evidence that soon there'll also be an adaption in user agreements due to this.
Concern goes with me at about the 18+ topics too. LGBT is one thing (only a minor topic), but more it becomes a concern for me how do topics about violence get treated in Russia? I've got a lot of dealing with that stuff besides all the political texts. And I've already got to be careful enough because of German authorities and lurkers which wait to find a possible future terrorist only by his blogposts and the topics he's interested in. That's already not too easy; and I personally don't have the many problems that those people make out of them talking about that stuff or integrating violence as a part of life that just exists.
Russian part of the internet also does a lot of things which are criminal by their own laws too and nobody cares, but how's that kept over here? Throughout the years never had any problems with it, but it's not final that this can't change...
So, yeah, a few question marks and insecurities for what this practically means to one. Also, what does it mean exactly for all those which aren't residents of the Russian Federation? Juridically one knows what your own authorities would do, but a platform also doesn't want to lose users, so what about "gifts out of customer-friendliness" - are there some or not?
It would be good knowing anything officially so that one knows what he can rely on.

[kaffy_r]

I've been crazy busy this past week, which is why I'm taking so long to get back and respond to peoples' comments. The delay has given me some time to read others' reactions to the TOS, and to think more about how I'm responding to it. I'm sure that you've read a lot more commentary on this since posting your comment here - and you've probably read commentary that is far more informed and thoughtful than mine.

One thing your post reminded me of is the fact that the globe is criss-crossed by the Internet; pixels cross borders far more easily than people or goods do, even though there are sad and unjust exceptions to that (the Great Firewall of China, closed loop internet ecologies such as those in Iran, etc. etc.) That brings netizens up hard against the contradictory laws of the countries from which they post and those of the countries in which their posts are read.

[matrixmann]

Well, I've seen quite a bunch of people making the jump to leave (well, I often found this a little too hysterical), also on the side of the Russian users was a certain exodus (could be seen in the user statistics of Dreamwidth), which at the moment is cut because, as someone told me, the site's been blocked in Russia.
So I'm guessing, it's also a little serious for them, and I don't expect only Navalny-disciples among them.

For the violence stuff I haven't become much smarter about it as it doesn't seem to affect that many people. You have political bloggers which deal with war, and through this they come to depicturings or descriptions of explicit violence here and there, but many more kinds don't seem to exist that have to do with it. And people with mental problems or handicaps, those pretty often post their most morbid stuff in secret as friends-only, so there's not much that can happen to them as they have unlimited audience.

[kaffy_r]

From what you're saying, I'm guessing that German laws regulate the depiction or discussion of violence, whether military or otherwise? I can see that this might be difficult for someone who is, say, a military historian, or a fan of some aspect of military life - weapons, strategy, etc.

I wasn't aware of the report that Russian bloggers were leaving the platform, or that Dreamwidth might have been blocked. I've done a Google News search and have found a fair amount on the former, but nothing yet on the latter.

[matrixmann]

German laws are pretty pissy and corwardly about the topic of violence - no matter if real or fictional.
Ever since the internet made it possible to transmit videos or larger data bundles, all people who keep themselves a little up-to-date build their ways around all these official restrictions that "youth protection" and the shit attached to it try to create. This applies to violent films as well as real war footage.

Admittedly, from that points of view of judging, written violence, not-visually-depictured violence, has the greatest amount of freedom how far it can push borders, I find. In modern times, there's rarely been a book or so ever having caught the attention because of descriptions of voilence alone; when it is the case, then it is because of other reasons these days (e. g. Nazi propaganda). No real comparison to movies or even video games, which regularly catch that attention of the youth protection system (even though they address an adult audience anyway...).

Only thing in online media these days is: Because of all the terrorist hysteria and security services wanting to recognize such people only by their online activities and interests, when doing such a thing through a blog and you're no commercial offerer, then it is not really difficult for you to get trapped in the net of being observed because of it.
Literally, if you don't offer your art for money or something, authorities here have a heavy problem of taking you serious as a craftsman of arts or free time casual hobby artist and not just regard you as a threat they have found.

If a little guarded by the free speech laws of other countries, it can maybe take a longer way until an online service provider really hands out the data they have in archive about you 'cause for that authorities first need to come up with a real good reason that justifies this action. Like e. g. you're in really deep shit by proofs.
At least if everything happens according to the legal way...

I've only been told Dreamwidth's been blocked by one person. Didn't hear anything like that from other Russian people, but due to that little exodus happening, it's always inside the frame of the possible. As Dreamwidth doesn't work according to Russian legislature, but American.