Russian interview with the head of SUP/LJ wank and boycott

[merchimerch]

This interview with Anton Nosik has been making the rounds, so I read it: http://www.izbrannoe.ru/30184.html

And yes, it seems that there is some incendiary language in how he speaks about the situation. He is saying that he won't put up with "blackmail" (shantazh) or attempts to destroy (unichtozhit') his business.

I think it is foolish to describe a boycott in such terms, and these phrases certainly aren't going to endear him to the LJ communities that I run with. Perhaps this interview betrays SUP's attitude that LJ users, especially free users, aren't really customers and don't need to be pandered to.

However, the interview makes sense to me in terms of Russian culture after the fall of the Soviet Union. It speaks to the "wild capitalism" that has been sweeping Russia and the former Soviet Union since the Glasnost era. Everything has a price in the culture of "wild capitalism" and as I understand it, Russian business models are somewhat more fierce and unforgiving than the model that LJ had when it started.

In the interview, Nosik essentially says that basic accounts are like giving away free merchandise at a shop, and that it's not good business. I think that's a bit of a clunky metaphor, since free samples are a staple at farmers markets, Costco, and other places. Free samples are giving away goods (tovar) in a way that is GOOD for business.

In the end, I'm not sure what I'm going to do about tomorrow's boycott. The interview doesn't represent the new owners of LJ in a very good light, at least from in my liberal, idealistic, creative-commons-oriented perspective.

Honestly this issue really needs to be understood within the larger debate of how humanity is affected when it is in a state of being perpetually advertised to. I have a plus account - banners and pervasive advertising are a reality in modern life. I like that basic accounts exist, since I do think it's nice to be able to opt out of being advertised to, but I'm fairly comfortable with it personally. I also use gmail and am subject to constant advertisement there, and in all the odd places that marketing now pops up in daily life - on cocktail napkins that the airline uses, on the doors of bathroom stalls, before the previews at movies, at the check-out stand in supermarkets, etc.

In summary - the interview doesn't cast Nosik and SUP in a feel-good, internet-as-creative-commons light. They are capitalists and profit driven. But is there a blogging alternative that isn't profit driven at this point? I know that I was attracted to LJ and stayed with it because of it's homegrown, non-Microsoft/myspace feel. It's been losing that steadily since it was first sold off. The issue for me is whether or not it has gotten bad enough to leave (for a day or for good) and whether there is truly an alternative in the current market that feels like LJ did in 2002 when I joined.

Comments

[thunderbox.livejournal.com]

I confess that it makes me cringe with embarrassment to see British and American LJ users excoriating wild capitalism when it was our economists (of the Chicago school, under the auspices of the IMF and World Bank) who parachuted in after the fall of the Soviet Union and told anyone who would listen that exactly this approach to business and society was a prerequisite for good relations with the west.

Edit: Just after I posted the above this pertinent piece (http://crookedtimber.org/2008/03/20/thank-you-mr-mankiw/) appeared in my RSS reader.

[mehitabelmmoss.livejournal.com]

We all have to make business decisions. I don't know what other options the new owners of LJ had. They will lose some users and some new users from this. What irks me is the way this was done and the lack of communication and the lack of consultation with the community. For that reason I will support the content strike.
Personally the advertising model on the internet is not growing - and since I use Firefox I am not bothered by ads on many sites that have them.
If LJ wants to become a myspace - well they will lose me. Myspace is a cesspool. They will lose many if the business model changes the character of the ste. There is a reason we are here and not other places.
I think LJ has many other options to increase revenue. They could make scrapbook useful and sell the bandwidth. But scrapbook sucks right now - hard to use. They could work on selling more gifts or minor upgrades.

[rednikki.livejournal.com]

I think it's not becoming a MySpace. On MySpace you can't opt out of ads. Here, you can pay - is it $15? - and opt out of ads.

And then there's Facebook, where you not only can't opt out of ads, but they sell your information and violate your privacy in the most unspeakable ways.

There are ways that LJ could change to make me leave, but advertising on free accounts isn't one of them. They have to pay for the server space somehow, and because part of my job is placing ads on a different web site, I know just how little they're making from the ads they put up. (Unless you're clicking on ALL the ads AND buying stuff, they're still not making as much as they would from a paid account.)

[mehitabelmmoss.livejournal.com]

MySpace is for hooking up etc. I was not thinking of the ads there as much as the character of the site. LJ is for journaling and conversation four you privately, for your circle of friends/family, or to meet new people. The interaction and attention span is more than / MySpace, FaceBook, or Twitter. That is the character that needs to be preserved.

[donaithnen.livejournal.com]

They can be a profit-oriented capitalist business if they want, however they're going to have to learn that when you're a media company and your customer base consists of the general public then they're going to have to get used to accommodating that user base, even when those users are upset about stuff. They can try to accommodate them with action or with words, or with a combination of both, but getting into an adversarial role with their users isn't going to work well in the long run.

[ame-chan.livejournal.com]

I can't read it and understand the original Russian, but I am suspecting that there are some fundamental cultural differences at the heart of, or at least causing part of the hullaballoo.

[kethryvis.livejournal.com]

Nosik is trying to explain himself, and blaming bad translations and such. He still comes off as an ass, but I'd be curious to know what you think about what he's saying now since you were actually able to read it in the original format. I feel like he's not saying anything different, and is just trying to play to the fact he assumes all of us read it in a translation, is trying to smooth things over but he really does feel this way. (I'm not phrasing myself well this morning, damned midterms!)

[merchimerch.livejournal.com]

I'm on my way into meetings with my own school drama, but I've skimmed his response and read some of the translations that were circulating.

Some of the translations aren't very generous in their wording. They have been used to fan the flames. The original Russian is still quite direct, blase, and occasionally flippant in character. Part of that is just what talking business is like in the Russian language/Russian culture, part of seems to be Nosik's character. Obviously the comment about not using the word "blackmail" because it was in Russian is shite. It seems like he's trying backpedal without making the concessions that LJ folk are asking for (i.e. listening to the advisory board).

I think it's obvious that he knew he needed to respond and save face, but there is still a major cultural disconnect between LJ users and Russian venture capitalist companies.

[fallen42.livejournal.com]

It hlps to realize that from the business perspective, users of such sites are the product of the business, and not the customers of the business. It's really easy for a businessman to forget that we can get pissed off and hurt their sales when they think of us as their product.