I Just Pinged LJ Regarding the Issue of Linking

[liz_marcs]

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?

Comments

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

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

[dragovianknight.livejournal.com]

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

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

Ah, thank you. It says I'm using Horizon, so maybe that explains it.

[dragovianknight.livejournal.com]

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

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I just switched to Vertigo to check and the link was gone. :-)

[liz-marcs.livejournal.com]

See? This explains why I can't see any abuse button at all.

I'm on the Vertigo scheme for my comment page.