I saw your departure from communities, realized that I'd seen your name a lot in the FanLib stuff as linked by metafandom, and didn't even realize that this particular scare was going around until one of my friends smelled a rat and wanted to double-check things with me. I may not be any form of Official LiveJournal Person outside of helping keep order in suggestions, but I do know who to ask about this sort of thing.
So she IMs me this morning wanting to know if I've heard anything about this, and pastes the hoax warning at me. It sounds like something I would have heard about if it were real, and it's got facts completely wrong all over the place, but just to be sure I figured I'd better ask.
Cue some "that's so hysterical, no" and some "... ahahahaha" and some "hahahahahahahahahahahahaha", topped off with a "wincest sounds like a new product from Mr. Gates that promotes incest somehow. NEW FROM THE MAKERS OF WINDOWS. WINCEST." from a bystander, and the hoax radar went from *blip* *blip* *blip* to *BLEEP* *BLEEP* *BLEEP* *BLEEBLEBLEEBLEBLEEP* -- it's one thing to get details wrong, but when there's a basic fact wrong and I can check it and prove it false in less than five minutes, then the whole thing stinks on ice. (For what it's worth, it sounded far more like the helpless laughter that comes with "Wait, what?!" rather than "wow, these crazy people will believe anything," because it was just such an unexpected interruption to everyone's peaceful morning.)
The phrasing really did discourage contacting LJ administration in any way, so I'm really not surprised that people didn't immediately think to go and complain/inquire.
It says repeatedly that this thing isn't LJ's fault, painting LJ as sympathetic but having no choice, being the pawn of the same organized bloc of mundane-type forces that fans seem to be up against. Fandom as a whole tends to respond really well to calls to keep a low profile and to keep a conspiracy of silence. We're used to operating in the margins and under official notice; there's this group paranoia that contacting anyone official about something related to fanfic is going to bring the law down upon the party and bust everything up. This hoax played on that willingness to keep the silence by explicitly saying to filter out everyone not known sympathetic and in fact anyone who might be willing to step up and take the risk of contacting someone and finding out the truth. The truth kills, after all...
If I didn't know and trust the usual Official LiveJournal Crew people the way I do, I think I might have been reluctant to contact them after reading that. The only personal risk I took in contacting them was the risk of looking a little silly in semi-private by asking if they could confirm or deny a rumor. People like you, without that history of trust, and with a lot to lose if the rumor was true, would be far less likely to ask questions about it.
It was also a lot easier for me to ask them than it would be for a whole lot of other people. I was in the right chatroom to start with, so all I had to do was switch between windows and type a few lines. Someone else would have had to at least compose an e-mail, then wait for a response. The response probably wouldn't have come in anything like real time. There are enough potential bits of trouble brewing that something that looks like a tempest in a fandom teapot might not get taken care of for a while, and meanwhile the wave of silent alarm sweeps along LJ, gathering momentum...
...yeah, I think I'm glad this one got caught earlier than it otherwise might have.
no subject
So she IMs me this morning wanting to know if I've heard anything about this, and pastes the hoax warning at me. It sounds like something I would have heard about if it were real, and it's got facts completely wrong all over the place, but just to be sure I figured I'd better ask.
Cue some "that's so hysterical, no" and some "... ahahahaha" and some "hahahahahahahahahahahahaha", topped off with a "wincest sounds like a new product from Mr. Gates that promotes incest somehow. NEW FROM THE MAKERS OF WINDOWS. WINCEST." from a bystander, and the hoax radar went from *blip* *blip* *blip* to *BLEEP* *BLEEP* *BLEEP* *BLEEBLEBLEEBLEBLEEP* -- it's one thing to get details wrong, but when there's a basic fact wrong and I can check it and prove it false in less than five minutes, then the whole thing stinks on ice. (For what it's worth, it sounded far more like the helpless laughter that comes with "Wait, what?!" rather than "wow, these crazy people will believe anything," because it was just such an unexpected interruption to everyone's peaceful morning.)
The phrasing really did discourage contacting LJ administration in any way, so I'm really not surprised that people didn't immediately think to go and complain/inquire.
It says repeatedly that this thing isn't LJ's fault, painting LJ as sympathetic but having no choice, being the pawn of the same organized bloc of mundane-type forces that fans seem to be up against. Fandom as a whole tends to respond really well to calls to keep a low profile and to keep a conspiracy of silence. We're used to operating in the margins and under official notice; there's this group paranoia that contacting anyone official about something related to fanfic is going to bring the law down upon the party and bust everything up. This hoax played on that willingness to keep the silence by explicitly saying to filter out everyone not known sympathetic and in fact anyone who might be willing to step up and take the risk of contacting someone and finding out the truth. The truth kills, after all...
If I didn't know and trust the usual Official LiveJournal Crew people the way I do, I think I might have been reluctant to contact them after reading that. The only personal risk I took in contacting them was the risk of looking a little silly in semi-private by asking if they could confirm or deny a rumor. People like you, without that history of trust, and with a lot to lose if the rumor was true, would be far less likely to ask questions about it.
It was also a lot easier for me to ask them than it would be for a whole lot of other people. I was in the right chatroom to start with, so all I had to do was switch between windows and type a few lines. Someone else would have had to at least compose an e-mail, then wait for a response. The response probably wouldn't have come in anything like real time. There are enough potential bits of trouble brewing that something that looks like a tempest in a fandom teapot might not get taken care of for a while, and meanwhile the wave of silent alarm sweeps along LJ, gathering momentum...
...yeah, I think I'm glad this one got caught earlier than it otherwise might have.