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 goldchaosdragon
2003-04-21 17:30
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I'm not sure what you mean here. Polls are available to EAs and (when they begin) Paid Accounts. Are you referring to the poll creator?
Chalk that one up to refusing to read the instructions. @_@ Bascially poll support would be server-side software that let users define their own polls and keep track of results, but it appears we already have that in place.
Part of the reason for the friends limit is to encourage paid accounts so that hardware upgrades will be able to be done in advance, so growth won't be an issue and invite codes won't be needed. Regardless, LJ already has a "lite" version - $5 gets you two months paid time and two invite codes.
My mind must have blanked out on the LJ site when I saw the whole "This is a free service, but if you know no-one you have to shell out" line in the create a journal FAQ. But along those lines, can't we still have a "lite" version of the paid account that, as someone else suggested, lets someone set up a static layout/icon set without committment? Five bucks is five bucks, after all.
Basic point of the post is that the friends limits could be done away with entirely with a little creativity in getting people to give money to the community. I mean, I can understand temporary friends limits while the tier system is being developed in order to keep strain on the system down, but I feel that if this is a permanent measure it's going to sabotage the entire point of the paid account by deflecting people who would otherwise join Blurty to other services that offer something more substantial for their paid accounts.
As people have pointed out in some of the other comment posts, people can't monitor communities or friends-only journals effectively with friends limits in place. If you (and I mean general you) really wanted to start putting restrictions on parts of the service, there are some other areas that could be restricted a little more sensibly: keeping Free Accounts from being the mod/creator of communities would slow community growth, encourage people to work on existing communities, and decrease the number of individual accounts.
And I really am serious about the image hosting thing (for layout pictures and pictures one wants to post in entries)... As far as I know there isn't a service running the LJ code that offers hosting, and it seems to be working rather well for sites like Diaryland. And with it getting harder and harder to remotely host images, it makes even MORE sense.(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread) |
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bertho
2003-04-22 01:03
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I should point out I'm not an admin (although I play one on TV), so I'm not sure exactly what the plans are for paid accounts, but I'm fairly sure that things like custom styles will remain when paid time runs up because I don't think the code really allows for stripping that. The account can be allowed to create a new one or not, but once you've chosen a style, it sticks.
The friends limit is still being discussed a bit. If you didn't notice, it was originally five, then got bumped up to ten shortly after. It's possibly that will be increased further, but I suspect it won't be much, if at all. In reality, this only places a limit on friends-only journals/entries you can read. You're free to see all public entries, still, it's just not as easy, and why should we make things easy for people who aren't supporting the site at all. (btw, going back to the expired paid account thing, paying for two months or whatever would likely allow you to add friends and keep them after your time ran up for the same reason - you wouldn't be able to add more at that point, though).
Note again, though, that I'm not positive about any of this, it's just an educated guess from what I know of the LJ code. You do bring up some good points, though. You might want to send some of your ideas over to  suggestions.(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread) |
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