Green Room - Week 4 - Day 3

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

This week's topic is due tomorrow! http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/878746.html

So please keep that in mind.

***

Speaking of "keeping that in mind" last night I *finally* connected two upcoming anniversaries. I knew about both of them, but for some reason never stopped and put them together before.

This spring is (of course, because I keep mentioning it) the 10th anniversary of LJ Idol.

This spring is also the 5th anniversary of Gary and Cynthia.

Which means that she has been around for *half of the duration of Idol*. Which just seems weird to me. Probably because those times in my life pre-Cynthia are just so intense and the times after have been a completely different (and calmer) world.

This also means that the era of "Gary getting soft" and "too nice" has been for almost half of the duration of Idol! That's weird for me to think about.

Granted, I didn't move in with her for a couple years into our relationship - but that almost immediately started having an impact on how things were run and how I looked at the competition itself.

***

Speaking of the "competition itself" and speaking of "speaking of"... I put a note for myself in yesterday's Green Room to remember "Open vs closed" in terms of "LJ Idol History".

I'm not sure how far into it I was planning on going - but "open vs closed" was a fundamental argument that happened in the early days of Idol.

There were quite a few people who argued for having a closed community - where entries would be posted in the community itself and you wouldn't be able to see anything unless you were a member. Heck, there were definitely some voices who wanted membership that would need to approved before you could join.

I wanted it open. For a number of reasons:

- Having an open space *does* make you more vulnerable to trolls and fake accounts and everything else. That was true. But it also makes it easier for people to find you and see what's going on. I believed, and I still believe that if people see what we are doing here at Idol that they are going to be interested enough to stick around, and maybe sign up.

- Almost a decade later, I still remember a post a friend of mine made ripping into in a really nasty way all the people who were "clogging her feed" with Idol posts. She was *angry* and kept insisting how she didn't want to read any of that... which was one of the light bulb moments for me of wondering just what made people decide that they had any sort of moral authority over what *someone else* could post in their own LJ. Keeping in mind that a lot of early Idol was non-fiction, where people were literally talking about their own lives, this is struck me as strange.

I wanted entries to be posted in the writer's LJ not only because it's great exposure for Idol (which, of course it is) but also because it's your material. I don't want there to be any doubt on who owns it because of where it's "being published on the web". It's yours. That's part of the whole Idol philosophy - I give you topics, and a set time to write something - but you are the ones who go out and make something with them. I wanted that clear.

There's more to it, but I should put this out there before it gets too late (aka I need to get to work! :D)