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(no subject)
Dear LJ:
I really appreciate the fact you keep working on improvements. I just wish you had the same improvements in mind as the rest of us seem to. Which means, less with the user-info redesigns and more with the actual features and bug-fixing.
Hi, I'm a paid user. I've been a paid user even when I wasn't using paid user-ness for, really, anything. I bought more user icons just because before I needed them. And now you've given me 'loyalty pics' I don't technically need the extra user icons again, whee! Because I've been a paid user for a while. Even though I didn't need it.
A while back, you gave everyone subdomains, like paid users had had, which was an excellent security move and I fully approve. Doing this, however, reduced the added value of purchasing a paid account. Some people will argue with me that this doesn't, because paid users can do everything they could before, but that's because they don't understand the statement. This isn't about how much I get. This is about /how much I get for my money/. My money no longer buys me a subdomain /because I get it anyhow/. Therefore, that... whatever it is a year... buys me a smaller feature set; less bang for the buck. But wait! More phone posts!
The catch being that phone posts are not a new feature, but a pre-existing one, used only by a small segment of the population. Those that use it will be grateful, but for me, it's a lot like offering nothing. Mind, I'll probably keep buying paid space, because it's a habit, but I expect there will be people who don't buy or don't renew because they don't need the phone posts and get the subdomain anyhow. (I won't factor in sponsored here.) But hey, security fix; it was important /then/, not whenever you came up with, developed, and tested new features. Give you some leeway there. But here we are, and you appear to be stuck for ideas.
As you seem to have the energy to do something entirely trivial and not-security related like redesigning the user-info (okay, I'll be fair - layout and coding are different tasks taking different skill sets and probably NOT done by the same people, so that point's not relevant, but I'm going to cheerfully pretend it is), I figured I'd make some recommendations for actually useful features which could be considered to bulk out paid accounts (and sponsored ones too, why not?) and possibly increase sales.
Plus, /I'd/ pay for them.
1) Full text journal archiving/search. Ideally, the ability to download your journal's history, complete with comments /and linked user icons/. Because user icons can be as much part of a comment as the words. It's like taking out all the emoticons and then misreading the tone. Because, you know, text. I'd like to be able to get a browseable copy of my LJ, linked internally but largely presented as-is on the servers. As far as search goes, I do note that the new profile page has a link to search lj-seek, but I'd rather have it integrated with LJ, so I can search protected or locked entries to which I am privy.
2)Option two is simpler: Expand all comment threads link/option. Yes, it makes for a HUGE PAGE that quite possibly runs off the side. There are times when I don't want to click every damn thread to see what people are saying, thanks. If I'm trying to read the comments to a post to see if something's already been said, I don't need to spend fifteen minutes clicking into and out of threads.
3) The third suggestion is the ability to subscribe to a thread/post, so that you can get notification when new comments are posted to it. If three or more people are talking in a comments thread, only the person whose journal it is will always get notification. I would think the ability to subscribe to posts would be a good thing. There are some security implications, possibly; this would have to be checked against lock levels, since lock levels can change, and in case someone opts to post a 'private' comment by posting and then deleting promptly, no /details/ about the comment should be sent, just 'activity on' 'reply to' type information. For further security, whether people (or just friends, or just a friends group?) could subscribe to your posts could (probably should) be a user option. Regardless of paid status or not, of course. Security transcends considerations of paid/unpaid distinction.
Love,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
letiwolf, who would really like these features, be they paid, free, or otherwise.
I really appreciate the fact you keep working on improvements. I just wish you had the same improvements in mind as the rest of us seem to. Which means, less with the user-info redesigns and more with the actual features and bug-fixing.
Hi, I'm a paid user. I've been a paid user even when I wasn't using paid user-ness for, really, anything. I bought more user icons just because before I needed them. And now you've given me 'loyalty pics' I don't technically need the extra user icons again, whee! Because I've been a paid user for a while. Even though I didn't need it.
A while back, you gave everyone subdomains, like paid users had had, which was an excellent security move and I fully approve. Doing this, however, reduced the added value of purchasing a paid account. Some people will argue with me that this doesn't, because paid users can do everything they could before, but that's because they don't understand the statement. This isn't about how much I get. This is about /how much I get for my money/. My money no longer buys me a subdomain /because I get it anyhow/. Therefore, that... whatever it is a year... buys me a smaller feature set; less bang for the buck. But wait! More phone posts!
The catch being that phone posts are not a new feature, but a pre-existing one, used only by a small segment of the population. Those that use it will be grateful, but for me, it's a lot like offering nothing. Mind, I'll probably keep buying paid space, because it's a habit, but I expect there will be people who don't buy or don't renew because they don't need the phone posts and get the subdomain anyhow. (I won't factor in sponsored here.) But hey, security fix; it was important /then/, not whenever you came up with, developed, and tested new features. Give you some leeway there. But here we are, and you appear to be stuck for ideas.
As you seem to have the energy to do something entirely trivial and not-security related like redesigning the user-info (okay, I'll be fair - layout and coding are different tasks taking different skill sets and probably NOT done by the same people, so that point's not relevant, but I'm going to cheerfully pretend it is), I figured I'd make some recommendations for actually useful features which could be considered to bulk out paid accounts (and sponsored ones too, why not?) and possibly increase sales.
Plus, /I'd/ pay for them.
1) Full text journal archiving/search. Ideally, the ability to download your journal's history, complete with comments /and linked user icons/. Because user icons can be as much part of a comment as the words. It's like taking out all the emoticons and then misreading the tone. Because, you know, text. I'd like to be able to get a browseable copy of my LJ, linked internally but largely presented as-is on the servers. As far as search goes, I do note that the new profile page has a link to search lj-seek, but I'd rather have it integrated with LJ, so I can search protected or locked entries to which I am privy.
2)Option two is simpler: Expand all comment threads link/option. Yes, it makes for a HUGE PAGE that quite possibly runs off the side. There are times when I don't want to click every damn thread to see what people are saying, thanks. If I'm trying to read the comments to a post to see if something's already been said, I don't need to spend fifteen minutes clicking into and out of threads.
3) The third suggestion is the ability to subscribe to a thread/post, so that you can get notification when new comments are posted to it. If three or more people are talking in a comments thread, only the person whose journal it is will always get notification. I would think the ability to subscribe to posts would be a good thing. There are some security implications, possibly; this would have to be checked against lock levels, since lock levels can change, and in case someone opts to post a 'private' comment by posting and then deleting promptly, no /details/ about the comment should be sent, just 'activity on' 'reply to' type information. For further security, whether people (or just friends, or just a friends group?) could subscribe to your posts could (probably should) be a user option. Regardless of paid status or not, of course. Security transcends considerations of paid/unpaid distinction.
Love,
letiwolf, who would really like these features, be they paid, free, or otherwise.
no subject
LJ staff is on the record as claiming that an expand-all-comments/auto-view-as-expanded option would kill their servers, and will therefore never be implemented. They have no problem implementing a "view all comments, but not threaded" option that I have no idea how to use even if I actually wanted to, and they have no problem with that weird "see all default icons when you search for users" thing, but apparently the other one is SERVER DEATH.
I think you can also download your entire journal to flip through it offsite, but I'm not sure if the setup requires you to make it a PDF or not, and that's kinda inconvenient when all you want to do is a straight search.
Third one I'm all for. Even if it was something complicated like "you put in a request to subscribe to the thread, individual commenters must check an extra box or something to approve your request" or whatever. USEFUL for roleplaying, or for generally important posts. Or for LJ staff themselves, for that matter; I'm sure they already have to play tricks with comment notifications to read their feedback, or else nobody reads the comments at all.
no subject
There is a simple download entries function LJ itself has, if I remember correctly. I believe it CAN actually capture comments, but nothing captures user icons.
You can get a third party program which can even log in for you and capture everything, but it doesn't get icons.
You can use a web-spidering program to mirror a browseable copy complete with user icons, but, it runs into trouble when you hit comments threads, because each comment has a thread link, and that generates another full copy of the page. And if you tell it to not exclude thread type links, you won't get the expansion for any threads which were too big for LJ to show fully off the bat.
I can imagine that on some threads the full view could be rather hard on servers, /but/ they could keep it treed, and still cap comments displayed on a page to say, 50. Whether they're expanded or not.
Yeah. So.
no subject
[nodnods] I mean, I follow CFUD, and CFUD's had at least one post max out the number of comments you can have on a post. And all of those comments had icons, and probably some of them had images too. I can see how it'd be inconvenient to try and see all of them unfolded at once! ...But the vast majority of LJ doesn't hit ~30K comments on a post ever, and I don't see how ~30K default icons loading simultaneously is that much easier on servers than comments too. Unless it's only easier because fewer people use the search functions now. >_>
no subject
Thinking about it, they do have to query all the posts in any thread stuck on the main page as it is, so you're only adding the text and the image, though both of those are larger items; the sender, title, date/time, stuff - it's all on the page from the lowest level up.
no subject
Heh! Point, that.