I used to keep up with all LJ news by reading the_lj_herald . Great one-stop LJ news source. But recently, the person who kept it up to date has announced the end of the Herald, because it's starting to feel like a chore.
But here's the good news: now there is the_lj_times , which is basically the same thing, run by someone else. I've joined immediately, I really can't be bothered to keep up with all the different LJ news communities and I do want to know what's going on.
If you're like me in this respect, you know where to go!

Because all content you post on your Facebook page belongs to them, to do with as they please; and it stays that way, even after you have your account canceled. Or, as their Terms Of Use put it:

You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain*, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.

So they own anything you post and have posted, and they can use it in any way they see fit. They can use your pictures for advertising. I'm not even sure what the implications would be if an artist puts his song lyrics on Facebook for the fans to enjoy. But surely no one would do that...
or would they?
If you want to know more, see this article.
And if you want to know even more, read Facebook's response to that here. Honestly I'm underwhelmed, but see for yourself.

And is LJ any better? Yes, in this regard it is.  Because in LJ's Terms Of Service, I found this:

All Content posted to LiveJournal in any way, is the responsibility and property of the author.
and:
LiveJournal claims no ownership or control over any Content posted by its users. The author retains all patent, trademark, and copyright to all Content posted within available fields.

Now that sounds a lot more reasonable to me. What say you?

*) Yes, after you've deleted it off your page, it's still theirs.

Update as of February 18:
Seems they have caught enough flak to make them reconsider.
See this blog entry.

Right here.

I'm not sure if I can keep it up to post (sort of) daily there until others start posting there as well. But I can't think of any other way to get a new community started, and it's worth a try, isn't it?

Right here.

I'm not sure if I can keep it up to post (sort of) daily there untill others start posting there as wel. But I can't think of any other way to get a new community started, and it's worth a try, isn't it?

I'm testing a client for posting to LiveJournal, because I want to find out if it can simultaneously post to LJ and Scribbld. This is a test, feel free to ignore.

Edited to add: it can! It just did. How very convenient!
In case anyone wants to try it, it's called Semagic and I found it here.

I'm testing a client for posting to LiveJournal, because I want to find out if it can simultaneously post to LJ and Scribbld. This is a test, feel free to ignore.

Edited to add: it can! It just did. How very convenient!
In case anyone wants to try it, it's called Semagic and I found it here.

In case you're interested, read more here in no_lj_ads .
If you want to keep up with stuff like this without having to read a ton of different communities, I suggest and recommend the_lj_herald .

In any case, I've backed up my journal. My spare journal is here.

I've started a new LJ community: amphibilove . For all those who love amphibians, such as the anura, the caudata and the gymnophonia (who live underground, have no legs and get up to 1,5 metres long, and of whom I'd never heard in my life before today).
It's hard to believe, but up til now, LiveJournal had no serious community for talking about newts and frogs. Unless we count Gussie Fink-Nottle's Newt Fanciers' Group (gfnnfg ).
This doesn't mean that I'll stop my newt postings here. I just may put the more... technical stuff over there.

I hope the new(t) community gets lots of members and interesting posts!

I wish I had a 'pissed off' user icon. But I'm a Basic Account user so I have only six. No room for frivolities.
And the reason why I'm a Basic Account user is that I don't think I like and trust SUP (the owners of LJ) enough to give them my monies, and yet I want an addless journal.
This used to be possible: there were free Basic Accounts available untill March 2008. No frills, no Scrapbook, no Voice posts, six user icons. All fine with me, and a very nice service level for something that's unpaid. But.
In March 2008, this account level was made unavailable to new users. First we were told it was because three account levels were 'too confusing', then they said that 'empatically,. it's a business decision'. I'm not sure there was a whole lot of empathy involved, but sure, it's a business and they call the shots, right? And they said existing Basic Accounts would be 'grandfathered'.

Now this month, they told us they were 'bringing Basic back'. Sounds good, right? But there was a price to pay.
Ads.
What else?
Users were asked for their input how and where these ads would be implemented.

The choice that was decided upon (and many users actually said they could live with) was: show ads on Basic journals, to everyone who isn't logged in.

So here it is. I specifically logged out and cranked up IE (my SeaMonkey has Adblock) to see what my journal would now look like to others, more specifically my mother. Click the pic for full size. If you dare.

I'm Not Happy about this.
Hello Mom? I'll be over next week, installing Adblock on your FireFox.

Just so you know.
I haven't posted here in over a week; however, I have been posting in a community that I started.
There are no major changes in my life that I need to tell you about; rest assured that both me and stoneshop are alive and well, be it a bit sweaty (it's been an exceptionally hot and humid day).

If I forget to post about my new motorcycle jacket, please remind me. It's cost me enough to warrant a posting.

These are for you!
Two LJ comunities you may enjoy:

library_mofo
libpatronssuck

Somehow I have a feeling that you'll fit right in!
Hope they may help you feel a bit better.
The rest of us may enjoy reading them. I know I will.

You can now go and vote for the post on the LJ Advisory Board, if you haven't done so yet. Here's the ballot box.
I voted as follows: first choice rm, second choice randomposting, and I had a hard time deciding on a third choice but I ended up voting for squeaky19.
Whoever you vote for, please take a little time to read his or her point of view on the issues at hand, before you decide.

And if you can't choose, just vore for rm because I say so  ;-)
I really think she is the best candidate that we can get on the Advisory Board.

While I'm not convinced that SUP will actually listen to their Advisory Board (they didn't listen last time, and abolished free Basic accounts while the Advisory Board thought that was a bad idea), I'm still interested in the things that are going on. If you haven't read about the elections, go here.

Furthermore, there's a new community that I think is interesting and worthy of your attention.
In fact, I'd like to encourage you to join this community called ljunited  , a community dedicated to working towards defending and restoring the original promises made to LiveJournal's members, standing up for the free speech of LiveJournal's members, restoring LJ's original strong support for Open Source software, and restoring community participation in the successful operations of LiveJournal.

LJUnited overwhelmingly endorsed rm as their candidate for the upcoming LJ Advisory Board elections. I hope you'll consider supporting her nomination.
My personal reason for supporting her is this:
I read her comments on news  postings, and they were always spot on. They were eloquent and at the same time matched my own views. I feel like she could actually represent me. If you're interested, read what she has to say.

So, the strike's over.
Not a word in news.
Why am I not surprised?

Copied from beckyzoole's blog.

The 24-hour strike will begin at the following times for the following locations:

Thursday, March 20, 2:00 PM -- Honolulu
Thursday, March 20, 4:00 PM -- Anchorage
Thursday, March 20, 5:00 PM -- San Francisco; Los Angeles
Thursday, March 20, 6:00 PM -- Mexico City; Denver
Thursday, March 20, 7:00 PM -- Chicago
Thursday, March 20, 8:00 PM -- Montreal; New York
Thursday, March 20, 9:00 PM -- Buenos Aires
Midnight -- London
Friday, March 21, 1:00 AM -- Paris
Friday, March 21, 2:00 AM -- Istanbul
Friday, March 21, 3:00 AM -- Moscow
Friday, March 21, 4:00 AM -- Dubai
Friday, March 21, 5:00 AM -- Islamabad
Friday, March 21, 6:00 AM -- Bangladesh
Friday, March 21, 7:00 AM -- Bangkok
Friday, March 21, 8:00 AM -- Singapore
Friday, March 21, 9:00 AM -- Tokyo
Friday, March 21, 10:00 AM -- Brisbane
Friday, March 21, 11:00 AM -- Sydney
Friday, March 21, 12 Noon -- Suva
Friday, March 21, 1:00 PM -- Auckland

I've disabled comments on my blog for now. See you all on Saturday Caturday!

Posted by darkrosetiger and translated from Russian by russianswinga. Thanks to both!
I'm reposting it in its entirety, I believe it speaks for itself.

( Click to read if you're interested. )

For a more balanced opinion, there's a different translation of the same interview, and some interesting notes on cultural differences, here. It's good to be informed.
Doesn't make me feel all that different, but you decide.

LiveJournal users are protesting recent changes in the site policy by declaring a 24-hour content strike. The one-day content strike is on for this Friday, March 21, from midnight GMT to midnight GMT.
Read all about it here.
I care about the issues mentioned, and I can deal with not posting any comments or posts for 24 hours, so I'm in.
I'm not going to be angry with anyone who isn't, we all make our own choices; I'm just telling you where I'm standing on this, and spreading the word.

Here's a quick pointer: check out Kukuburi if you haven't already. It's full of vibrant colours, great illustration and delightful weirdness. Updates every Tuesday.

Well, I am.
LiveJournal has decided to get rid of Basic accounts as an option for new members. Existing basic accounts will be allowed to stay. This was announced, or rather not announced at all, in this news posting, which merely says: We streamlined and simplified things so that now it’s faster and easier than ever to create a LiveJournal account.
Users wanted to find out what that meant, noticed differences in the account options as mentioned in the FAQs, and were enraged. That news posting got over 2400 comments so far.
The staff appeared to be taken by surprise by this uproar, after all, as they said, 'existing users aren't influenced by this decision', that they first tried to 'sell'  as an attempt to make the signup proces 'easier'. Users didn't agree, for several reasons:
- Some users want more journals, for different purposes, so many existing users WILL feel the influence.
- 'Basic' users provide content, too. Many of them provide a lot of the content that many of the paid users are here for. In other words, what's left of LiveJournal if your friends don't want to use it anymore, because they have to either pony up or swallow the ads as soon as they do join?
- Many users don't feel that they can recommend LJ to friends anymore.
I'm one of them. I want to tell people 'Come on over to LiveJournal, it's free, and you don't have to have ads on your blog if you don't want to'. But that's not true anymore. Do I have to tell them how to install FireFox or SeaMonkey and AdBlock now, as well?

There's a new news posting out. It's gotten 1968 comments so far. You don't need to read all of those, but you might want to read the news posting itself.
At least, they're now openly saying that yes, it was a 'business decision'.  :-/

I left MySpace for this, only to find it turning into a MySpace clone?
Hell yes, I'm angry!

If you read this, if your eyes are passing over this right now, (even if we don't speak often) please post a comment with a COMPLETELY MADE UP AND FICTIONAL memory of you and me. It can be anything you want - good or bad - BUT IT HAS TO BE FAKE. When you're finished, post this little paragraph in your journal and be surprised (or mortified) about what people DON'T ACTUALLY remember about you.

(Saw this in miketroll's and diamondlucy's journal and liked the idea.)