OMG WTF KGB

[roadrunnertwice]

Uh, wow, that's the first time I've gotten sucked into reading all the fuck about a massive LJ meta wank. I usually manage to just read the basics and move on; not really sure what happened this time.

Anyway, I suppose I welcome our new Russian overlords. If I have to.

EDIT: Also: Holy freaking balls, Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together! (It's really good, guys.)

Comments

[boopsce.livejournal.com]

Would you consider posting a synopsis of the wankery?

[roadrunnertwice]

'Kay, so back in '05, Brad Fitzpatrik's company, Danga, sold Livejournal to Sixapart, makers of Movable Type. Then (I think it was last year), Sixapart subcontracted with a Russian company called SUP to provide LJ-related services in Russia.

Now, LJ is HUGE in Russia. They don't have a strongly biodiverse blogosphere over there. In the English-speaking net, you've got people blogging on MySpace, you've got Google's Blogger, you've got nine or ten other major services, and you've got a gazillion people running their own installation of Wordpress or MT on commodity webhosting. In Russia... everyone's just on LJ. And when Russian bloggers learned that their stuff was going to be hosted on a Russian server, a bunch of them freaked. SUP has some potentially-sketchy connections to some government figures, and since being an outspoken political journalist in Russia seems to be a good way to get gunned down in the stairwell, a lot of people immediately took the subcontracting to be a covert government bid for control and suppression of the blogosphere. Also, there was another group of Russians who considered SUP to be untrustworthy because it was--get ready for this--controlled by Jews. (Russia, man.)

Anyway, Sixapart just sold LJ to SUP. Deriving the wank is left as an exercise for the reader.

--Oh, wait, and there's counter-wank, too. Sixapart has made a handful of really bad decisions involving LJ during the last two years (see: breastfeeding icons, suspension of rape-survivor communities and porny fanfic groups, "sponsored" gifts, introduction of ads, Snap.com, and maybe one or two that I'm forgetting), and those are all being dredged back up (and re-fought-over) as--

a: evidence that 6A was not the appropriate home for LJ and the new Bay-area shell company that SUP is incorporating to handle it will be a better fit (note that Brad is going to be back to act as a consultant, though he works for Google right now)...

or b: evidence that 6A lacks the judgement to even FIND a better home for LJ.

---

It was kind of like being sucked into a sanity-devouring vortex of spleen. I can't recommend it.

[boopsce.livejournal.com]

On the one hand, do you really trust the Russian government?

On the other hand... OH NOES THE SKY IS FALLING *runs around shrieking*

[roadrunnertwice]

I kind of hate and fear the Russian government, which I think makes me an honorary Russian or something. And considering the compromises that seem necessary to achieve much success in Russia, I can't say I have much trust for Russian businessmen as a class.

I do tend toward giving 6A the benefit of the doubt, despite their screw-ups. And Brad seems to be legitimately excited about it. We'll have to see. I'm cautious, but I honestly don't expect a whole lot to change, for us or for Russian dissidents.

(But I think the ruckus over there is both beneficial and overdue. Monocultures are bad, bad, bad, and the blogosphere in any politically corrupt area needs way more redundancy than that.)