Friday open thread: Dreamwidth

[dolorosa_12]

After a challenging and tiring few weeks, the Friday open thread returns, with a prompt inspired by all the love and activity I've seen around 3weeks4dreamwidth. I haven't been able to be very engaged with this at all, as it coincided with a professionally and personally very busy time, but I was reminded again of what a singularly wonderful little corner of the internet we have here, and how happy I am that this is my primary social internet home.

Therefore, this Friday's prompt is: what is special for you about Dreamwidth, and why do you like it?

I could answer with all the usual things, like the fact that makes money solely from user subscriptions, rather than algorithmic feeds, ads, or selling user data, that it has an ethos built on privacy and persistent pseudonymy, that it's text-based and slower-moving, the icon culture inherited from LJ in which icon use becomes a whole visual language, that there are filtered levels of privacy controlled by the user on a post-by-post basis, and so on, but all that's been said by many people, many times.

As well as all of the above, the things that I find particularly special about Dreamwidth (and which solidified its place as my primary internet home many years ago) are:

The perfect balance that we, as a user community, seem to have built up over the years organically, between the personal and the communal — in the sense that posts and comments are built for conversation and discussion by default, and shared into all subscribers' (chronological) feeds by default, but we all have a very clear sense that a person's posts and journal are that person's individual space, where they have freedom in both form and content. While I'm not going to say this kind of thing doesn't exist here on Dreamwidth, I personally never see the kind of outraged 'why is nobody talking about this?' (or 'why is everybody talking about [this frivolous thing] instead of [this outrage]?'), or people berating one another over choices of style or topic (or trying to drive mobs of followers to descend in outrage on other people's posts). Not every post I encounter on Dreamwidth is of interest to me (and I'm sure that's the same for everyone reading this when they think about my own journal) — although I've discovered so many new interests, and read posts by people on topics that I would never have even thought about, but which are made interesting through the way the person writes about them — and that's totally okay, as the assumption is that people will just scroll on by when required. There's no expectation of constant engagement and paranoia around metrics and short attention spans.

This sounds counterintuitive, but I actually like that Dreamwidth is a bit user-unfriendly to people whose primary engagement with the internet is via very user friendly social media platforms with a low barrier to entry. Obviously I want Dreamwidth to continue to exist, so it needs a critical mass of people to use and fund it to remain financially sustainable, but I appreciate that it requires a little bit of effort (type at least a few words into a post, or into a comment), and that passive usage (scrolling, liking, or the equivalent of sharing/reblogging/retweeting with a single click of a button) is basically impossible. In my opinion, this slight barrier to entry (probably combined with the fact that image hosting is complicated) helps keep it a generally pleasant community space, because the kind of rage-baiting virality that targets people's psychological vulnerabilities would be such hard work here.

What about you? What do you appreciate about Dreamwidth? What keeps you here?

Comments

[eglantiere]

agreed to your points! especially a bit of user-unfriendliness as an encouragement to... engage more. and also DW to me feels like it lets me really coalesce the people i'm reading from into people, with more of a picture of them. like i like tumblr, but it's very easy for me to default to simply scrolling and liking and reblogging without adding anything, and also to not like really... have clear pictures of people i'm interacting with in my head, unless i know them from somewhere (mostly dreamwidth lol) else.

[dolorosa_12]

That is a perfect way to put it. My first encounter with the social internet (forums and then LJ) did involve that kind of baked-in user-unfriendliness, and I came to expect and require it, such that when I encountered the user friendly opposite (on Tumblr, and later on places like Twitter and Instagram) I found it kind of alienating and lacking in a sense of connection. I've come to believe that we need a little bit of effortful friction, not just in social spaces on the internet, but in every context that involves consciousness and collaboration to build a genuine sense of human connection.

[jesse_the_k]

Yes, precisely -- my D-roll[1] is human!

[1] vain attempt to replace f-list

[dolorosa_12]

Both you and eglantiere above put it so perfectly: it's a fundamentally human corner of the internet.

[sixbeforelunch]

Agree very much with your points!

This sounds counterintuitive, but I actually like that Dreamwidth is a bit user-unfriendly to people whose primary engagement with the internet is via very user friendly social media platforms with a low barrier to entry.

A lot of tech designers like to talk about the "frictionless experience" but something I've been thinking about lately is that friction is how we sand the rough edges off of things. If you never encounter any friction, you never stop, you never have to change or reevaluate. You just move along in whatever direction the outside forces nudge you. I've come to se a certain amount of friction as a really valuable part of the world, making harder for bad actors to manipulate people, and forcing even good-faith actors to stop and think from time to time before going with the flow.

[dolorosa_12]

You are so right about friction, and not just in the context of the social internet. I've come to believe that effortful friction is necessary in every situation that involves human consciousness and human connection.

[renay]

I also like that Dreamwidth rewards lurking and learning about the different groups/fan cultures, which is not something other more social apps do because they want people to post post post and help them generate eyeballs for ad revenue. I fear we've all been harmed by the lack of lurking culture. Dreamwidth feels like a safe place to still work out opinions in, too.

[dolorosa_12]

That is a very good point! There is generally a baseline assumption of good faith, and the fact that everything unfolds at a slower pace gives people more space to work things out — there's no impetus to leap in, metaphorical guns blazing to pick fights in real time. And while it's not quite the same thing as you're talking about with the lurking, I personally appreciate that it's possible to read (unlocked) posts and make comments (when the settings allow it) without having an account or being logged in. That's vanishingly rare in most social corners of the internet these days.

[tellshannon815]

This is something I've been thinking recently, that I feel I enjoy fannish discussion more here and I don't feel I have a sense of humour fail here (there's this repeated "joke" I keep seeing on Facebook that I didn't think was particularly funny first time around, let alone eleventy-six more times. This isn't the show where I've tended to see it, but think along the lines of "I just started watching Buffy, I'm really looking forward to seeing Jesse's character development, he's going to be my favourite I'm sure!" and trying to get people seriously wondering "Should I tell them?")

[dolorosa_12]

That's so wonderful to hear! I'm so glad the tenor of fannish discussion makes this a good fannish home for you. I'm not on Dreamwidth primarily for fandom, but I find it suits me better in both form and content too. I was on Tumblr for years, and I found the Tumblr way of doing fandom actively alienating.

[torachan]

For me it's that while I use other social media platforms, I have never really adapted to them and the LJ/DW style of journaling remains my preference. I respond to people on bluesky and post cat pictures there, but I feel weird making text posts. It just doesn't feel natural.

[dolorosa_12]

I relate to this a lot. Earnest, social journalling is my preferred internet mode, so this is the perfect home for me. I'm glad it feels that way to you too.

[thatjustwontbreak]

Such a lovely topic.

very clear sense that a person's posts and journal are that person's individual space

^I feel like you hit the nail on the head with this. We really respect each other's deal here, and that is so freaking special.

I love so many things about this place. I love how Dreamwidth is old internet, I love that people have so many norms around fandom, I love that it's an international community. Also, having only started participating last year, I'm thrilled by how kind and welcoming people are.

Also, so many people are writers and even in casual posts, some of the prose stops me in my tracks it's so good.

[dolorosa_12]

Also, so many people are writers and even in casual posts, some of the prose stops me in my tracks it's so good.

You are so right! There are some excellent writers here.

I'm glad — as a relative latecomer to Dreamwidth — that it's as perfect a fit for you as it has been for poeple who have been here for decades!

[chestnut_pod]

I love the things you love :)

Also, I'd like to add the longevity that it fosters. The lack of algorithmic organization, the centralization in personal journals, and the fact that they are framed as journals rather than some other thing means that people often stay for years -- decades! I made wonderful friends on tumblr, but the ones who stuck were the ones where that friendship was able to transition off-platform. Here, however, I am friends with people I've known for years and years strictly on Dreamwidth, and I anticipate (and hope!) to know them for many years more.

[dolorosa_12]

That's a very good point. And (this may just be a me thing) people's consistency in tagging means that it's theoretically possible to go back decades through a particular tag, and see how someone's grown and changed in relation to that specific, tagged thing — there's a kind of longevity in that sense of continuity and change. (As I say, the sheer amount of earnest, librarianish thought I put into my own tagging system means it's something I always notice and think about in other people's journals as well — this may not be a universal experience!)

Here's to many more decades!

[evewithanapple]

Dreamwidth is never ever going to show me a post that I didn't specifically go looking for, and for that I am eternally grateful.

[dolorosa_12]

I'm right there with you — it's an enormous, and vanishingly rare gift.

[author_by_night]

In my opinion, this slight barrier to entry (probably combined with the fact that image hosting is complicated) helps keep it a generally pleasant community space, because the kind of rage-baiting virality that targets people's psychological vulnerabilities would be such hard work here.

I LOVE this point, and I think I completely agree with you!

I just love having a place to write, and to be somewhat anonymous. That's a huge luxury anymore. Also, it helps me keep in touch with fandom friends I've had for years.

[dolorosa_12]

I just love having a place to write, and to be somewhat anonymous. That's a huge luxury

A pseudonymous, text-based space was my first experience of the social internet, and I honestly neither need nor want anything more. We're so lucky to have this space where that remains the norm.

[hoarmurath]

You and commenters make nice points. I am not very good at DWing but I appreciate being able to lurk/comment the people who are. :D

[dolorosa_12]

I appreciate you too, and am always very happy when you pop up in my comments!