liz_marcs | I Just Pinged LJ Regarding the Issue of Linking

Current Mood: frustrated

I Just Pinged LJ Regarding the Issue of Linking

Right now, an awful lot of people are saying LiveJournal will ToS your journal if you provide even a link to material LJAbuse would deem ToS-worthy (using, of course, LJ's invisible guidelines that we — the customers and content providers — have yet to see) as if you were hosting the content on the LiveJournal servers.

I'm not talking about displaying images that are hosted on another site (i.e., Photobucket or DeviantArt) using the <<img>> tag.

I'm talking about just providing a link to content or an image using the <<a href>> tag that LJ Abuse deems ToS-worthy.

See the response this user got when he/she asked that question.

Another LJ user asked the same questions and got the same response from an LJ/6A employee. (H/t to

wesleysgirl for the link.)

Note that this new off-site linking stance is in direct violation of LJ's own abuse policies.

I want to be clear: I'm not calling the OP a liar, but this response beggars belief as far as I'm concerned, especially since Web sites change all the time and it's not that hard to imagine a once-innocent link to, say to an article on SuicideGirls (warning link may be NWS), could suddenly become rife with problems.

So I decided to ask Support for myself.

Within seconds of me posting my request Support tagged it as private, so good luck seeing Request#: 797739 if you want to confirm that I did, in fact, do this.

I'll just have to give you the text of what I asked:

There is currently a rumor going around the user base that LJ/6A would delete or suspend a journal if the user links to a Web site or Web page that contains content that the Abuse Team deems as objectionable.

I'm not talking about displaying an objectionable image hosted on, say Photobucket, and linked using the "img" tag.

I'm talking about linking to a site or an image using the "a href" tag.

So, for example, I post a link to a Web site( a link and nothing more) and say someone reports the entry to LJ Abuse.

If LJ Abuse deems that I have, indeed, linked to material that would otherwise get me ToS'd if LJ servers were hosting it, would my account be suspended/deleted because I merely posted a link to another Website?

Thank you for your prompt response on this matter.

As soon as I get a response, I will post it here.

Either that, or LJ is going to ToS me for posting a link to SuicideGirls.

Screw it. If this journal disappears, that's a pretty much solid answer, don't you think?

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Like you, I know that I saw it elsewhere, too, but this was the newest link I could find.

In either case, I'm having a really, really hard time believing it because, daaaaaaayum. That violates LJ's own ToS where it specifically states that they keep hands off all off-site links.

I suppose I want to see a response for myself because I'm having a very, very hard time believing it.

(Can you tell I'm floored? Because I totally am floored right now.)

I'm totally floored, too. I don't even know what to say or do. Seriously. It's just... how can they say that? People link all over the place all OVER the internet. I'll bet a quarter of what gets posted on LJ includes links of SOME sort. How is this even possible?

And don't forget...that shiny abuse button is gonna be right at the bottom of all our posts where any monkey with a keyboard can get to it.

So we're just upped the ante right there.

Sure, I've got every single post (including this one) backed up to LJ-SEC, and I've been triple-posting, but I am soooooo not in love with a dagger poised to stab me in the back of the head because someone stumbles on to one of my public posts and takes offense...and I know I have my share of offensive links that I've put up over the past 3 to 4 years.

Ha! I found it:

http://p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com/62888.html?thread=643752&format=light#t643752

Shoot.

And he's not one of the hysterical ones, either.

I'll provide a link to the LJ entry and credit you.

I don't need credit! I didn't write the thing. :-P

I honestly can't understand how this is even possible. LINKING to something that you are not in any way responsible for creating or hosting can get you permanently suspended with no warnings? There is not enough WTFery IN THE WORLD.

To be fair, the report abuse button is at the bottom of this page I'm using to comment -- scroll to the bottom, it's a link, not a button, directly under "Feedback & Contact Us" (in my browser, anyway.) And it's not AS simple as clicking the button -- you have to fill out several pages' worth of info.

But yeah. It sucks beyond suckitude. :-(

It's not there for me. I'm using Vertigo,it was there YESTERDAY...but today, the links have all been redone and the report abuse link is GONE.

::blinks::

Weird. It's there for me. I'm using Mozilla on a Mac. *Scratches head*

What viewing scheme are you using? Maybe they're dicking around with the code.

I have NO IDEA, LOL. How would I tell what viewing scheme I'm using? *Is clueless*

You should be able to check here (http://www.livejournal.com/manage/settings/).

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wesleysgirl.livejournal.com - 2007-08-10 00:39 (UTC) - Expand

I bet you're using Horizon, because the link is there when I switch to that.

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wesleysgirl.livejournal.com - 2007-08-10 00:43 (UTC) - Expand

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liz-marcs.livejournal.com - 2007-08-10 00:56 (UTC) - Expand

Huh. I see no 'report abuse' button or link at all. At the very bottom of my browser page is 'Terms of Servie' link, 'Viewing Options' link...stuff like that. But no 'report abuse' link anywhere that i can see.

Hrmmmmmmm.

Are you using Vertigo as your viewing scheme? Apparently people using Horizon can see it, and people using Vertigo can't.

'Punquin Elegant', unless that's...something else. No clue, actually.

It turns out that if you use Vertigo as the template for your comment page, it's not there. It is on the Horizon scheme. I don't know if it's on the other schemes as well.

Um.
Uh.
Scheme?

Ah ha!
I use Punquin Elegant. Is that a scheme?

I know, I was the same, above! Check here to see which scheme you're using. (It's not the layout of your actual journal, it's the layout that you see when you're looking at LJ's own main pages.)

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tabaqui - 2007-08-10 01:58 (UTC) - Expand

Yes. What it means is that when people comment on your LJ, they see your LJ Style (Punquin Elegant) unless they've force a "style mine" on the comment pages (in that case, they see their own commenting page style).

There's a way to force it so that your journal has "no style" (or rather, one of LJ's standard schemes (here: http://www.livejournal.com/manage/settings/). It could be that they're still futzing with the code, because the Vertigo scheme doesn't have the abuse link, but the Horizon scheme does. It could be they haven't gotten around to making all the various LJ styles carry that bit of code either.

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tabaqui - 2007-08-10 01:56 (UTC) - Expand

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iko.livejournal.com - 2007-08-10 02:41 (UTC) - Expand

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tabaqui - 2007-08-10 02:49 (UTC) - Expand

Here's a couple more, linked to me by a user for the letter...

I honestly don't know what to say to this.

The only thing that I find really interesting is that a lot of these seem to be from the same guy in LJ Abuse, and I believe he's the same one who claimed that the deleted users' pics had no artistic merit. Almost makes me wonder if they don't have a renegade in LJ Abuse.

Man, we've gotta get some transparency there too.

~Lisa

[Bad username or site: bethbethbeth / @ livejournal.com] said that all of the abuse responses used to be signed by "scott." we think they might just be rotating names or something.

of greater concern is the possibility that lj in fact does not understand the difference between a link and the actual of insertion of material such that it is housed on lj's server. i suppose i shouldn't be surprised...

The thought's occurred to me too, which is why I specifically spelled out the difference between an img tag and a href tag.

i saw. i guess i'm wondering whether they're still not understanding why the distinction is important. i wouldn't think that that was possible, but i've seen them conflate obscenity and child pornography so many times, despite repeated attempts to get them to discuss them separately, that i wonder.

Yes. That's been my big thing since the Strikeout is the total lack of transparency. You'd think the last thing any Web site with an international user base would want is mass confusion among the masses.

At least if we had some transparency, we'd be able to see where they're coming from. Right now, I feel like I'm watching a drunk stumble around the room slurring that he's gunna git whoever for some vague wrong that only he can see as actually wrong.

There's not enough headdesky in the world right now.

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