silverthunder: (Alphonse - I'll pass)
Aphrael ([personal profile] silverthunder) wrote2006-09-08 08:55 am

For those who don't know already

LiveJournal has released a feature that allows users to track journals and posts without listing the journal among your friends. Basically, you click a button and BOOM! All posts on the journal or all comments on the post (depending on which you're tracking) are sent to your email.

Sound harmless? Well, maybe.

I think it's creepy. I'm already about 90% friends-only; only the fluff posts and memes are left un-friends-locked, and those who don't comment to me and let me know they want to know the boring details of my daily life don't get added as friends. But still.

Suppose I make a public post - for whatever reason; I have friends who don't have LJs and I link them to certain posts sometimes - and someone wishes to make a comment on it that's really only meant for me. The easiest way to do this has always been to comment and then quickly delete it. That way I get it in my email but no one else sees it. Well, now someone COULD see it, because if you're watching a post, you get those comments in your email as well.

Not to mention the fact that I'm sure we've all had those moments when we post something and then think 'oops' and delete it because it's not necessarily something we want everyone seeing. 'Oops' isn't going to cut it if someone's already watching you, is it?

At the very least, I think we should be informed when someone is stalking our journals or our posts, and who those people are. Paranoia could sink in pretty fast otherwise.

[livejournal.com profile] anax provided a nice handy link to the release post for those who would like to express their concerns. I've already expressed mine.

[identity profile] anax.livejournal.com 2006-09-08 11:26 pm (UTC)(link)
If it's so harmless, and stuff that everyone can already see anyway ... then why do we even have/need this "feature"? I mean, you can already see everything that could possibly be emailed to you, so why is LJ bothering?

[identity profile] replica.livejournal.com 2006-09-08 11:43 pm (UTC)(link)
...I have already said, it has made it more convenient. Why do we have half the features we have? Because they're convenient. Why else?

People are all running around screaming about being stalked and their privacy being violated, when it hasn't at all. LJ limited it to things that are already public for that reason. And again, if someone was going to stalk someone else online, they'd be doing it with or without LJ's little comment notification system.

[identity profile] anax.livejournal.com 2006-09-08 11:49 pm (UTC)(link)
And they'd need to go about it with more effort. Since it's so easy to do anyway, there seems to be little point to making it effortless, except to facilitate stalking.

[identity profile] replica.livejournal.com 2006-09-09 12:00 am (UTC)(link)
Mmmk. Well, you can be in your little paranoid corner worried about getting stalked and your public privacy violated, and I'll be in my little total-lazy-ass corner glad I don't have to bookmark a million and one posts just to keep up with interesting public discussions, and we'll go our separate ways and agree to disagree :D

[identity profile] anax.livejournal.com 2006-09-09 12:03 am (UTC)(link)
As you like. I wish I were like you - you obviously have no experience with being on the wrong end of a stalker. I do. It isn't paranoia.

[identity profile] replica.livejournal.com 2006-09-09 12:12 am (UTC)(link)
No, I can't say as I've had much experience with being stalked. But it doesn't mean I haven't had other bad things happen to me. I just prefer not to let them get the best of me and dictate my future. *shrug*