Sometimes I wonder

[chani]

What's the point? What's the point in doing this LJ thing again? 

I can't tell you how many times I have been about to quit. 

Because I had a dream, you know. It was to create a place where we could gather and discuss screen stuff around a virtual cup of tea.  I wanted to use the web in order to hold a salon as Julie de Lespinasse or La marquise du Deffand did in the 18th century. We would have discussed movies and television as their guests used to discuss books and ideas of the Enlightement at the time.

But overall I failed. 

The only times people really gathered in here were when the topic was about kinks or about commenting/lurking/de-friending because they felt curious, teased or in need of explaining themselves...which means they came when it was not a salon but rather a playground. It was cool, but it wasn't what this LJ was supposed to be.

 I've indulged myself with playground stuff, I've posted memes when they were connected to the Jossverse or to movies, or just because I knew some of "my friends" liked to learn things about their flist and it was a way to connect -which is good- but I could have done the very same thing on their LJ. 

I'm all for the Internet to be a place of sociability, but it's something I can have elsewhere, on boards, on my friends' LJ...


So what's the point? 

Why should I keep on updating? Does anyhting of this  still worthwhile? Has it ever been?

I can't help thinking that somehow, somewhere, I made a mistake or somewhat lost my way...

Comments

[chrissie-linnit.livejournal.com]

I use my LJ as just that... a journal. An on-line diary of sorts. My life is not very interesting, but by committing my thoughts to a place, I feel as if I have a sense of existence. An impersonal ether, as safe as a locked diary but, open to the eye of any stranger who might come across it. It's safe, and a fine confidant.

I'm delighted that I've found a small group of people who like me enough, despite learning possibly far more than they'd really like about me, to interact with me... empathise, criticise, argue and counter argue. Most of my stuff is family tosh, but I do occasionally ramble on about the lack of any real debates like we used to get on the BC&S Board.

I think the reason is because LJ is NOT a discussion forum. It's really a collection of individual journals, isn't it? And any entries posted to an LJ are dependent upon the FList, and any passing lurkers, finding the author's comments stimulating enough to enter into a discussion.

When you review films, I'm at a loss. I can't comment on films because I rarely go to the cinema. I occasionally comment on meta, especially when the post stimulates me. I think what you would like to get from LJ just isn't there consistently enough. LJ is too personal and individual a tool for that.

We need to go back to the Boards for intellectual stimulus, I fear. I do miss the 'healthy' debates and discussions we used to have and I'm surprised that more of the Jossverse writers themselves don't miss the intellectual stimulus - although I note more and more are new since I left BC&S and there a fewer and fewer of the Old School writers left.. could that be a contributory factor, too? Maybe the fanfiction writers frequent places we don't know about to get the intellectual stimulation?

How's BC&S doing lately?

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

I was hormonal yesterday when I posted (I guess I did need to bleed!), I'm more "balanced" now, but I meant what I said. I had to publicly acknowledge that I failed, that my motives for posting entries, my expectations didn't tie in with what LJ was. Mea Culpa, maxima mea...

Ok maybe it was also away to take a poke at LJ and challenge my possible readers in their own motives for posting. A little bit.

BC&S is pretty dead these days. So many have left.