A new year and a look back: 12 months on LiveJournal.

[bironic]

Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of my first post. Tonight heralds the start of autumn and the commencement of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. (A very happy New Year to those who are observing.) Altogether a good time for a little recap. There was going to be a bunch of ficlets to celebrate, but they're not done yet, so it'll just be this navel-gazing for now.

This year on LJ, I:

• Learned how to craft posts that weren't bloated with two or three posts' worth of information. (This one is my favorite cringe-worthy example.)
• Discovered the joy of giving and receiving feedback.
• Fell hard into House fandom and became part of an online community for the first time instead of watching from the outskirts or participating mainly in conferences/conventions.
• Posted five pieces of fanfiction in two fandoms, totalling 19,700 words (with another 4,000 of Spike story and 1,400 of ficlets on my computer getting worked on). Have been thrilled to see several of them Memory'd and included on people's fic rec lists.
• Held a month-long Memoryfest (friends-locked).
• Hosted a birthday talk-about-your-usernames festival. (Still open! Drop in if you haven't yet.)
• Befriended people I've never met and didn't have plans to meet.
• From an initial list of six or seven friends, became "friend of" 56 people/communities (!), 54 of which are legitimate and 20 of whom I know in real life. Also known as the discovery of the golden rule, Create and Ye Shall Be Friended.
• Wrote 176 posts, including reviews for 26+ movies, two plays, half a dozen ballets, nine books, and a lot of episodes of House. May I take a moment to apologize again to all the Harry Potter people who've put up with that last?
• Found out exactly how much LiveJournal eats one's life.

Top Commenters on bironic's LiveJournal

1	kabale	140
2	catilinarian	130
3	daasgrrl	66
4	maddy_harrigan	56
5	michelle_nine	42
6	synn	37
7	firestorm717	31
8	musicisbelievng	21
9	captain_tulip	20
10	thewlisian_afer	19

11	usomitai	18
12	secondsilk	17
13	pynelyf	15
14	thirdblindmouse	14
15	crazypalefreak	11
16	mateo10	10
17	bethctg	8
18	elynross	7
19	pun	6
20	gingergirl1977	6
21	lysa1	6
22	simple__man	5
23	fallen_arazil	5
24	alisel_kat	5
25	elanor_isolda	5
26	renoir_girl	4
27	mistressofmagik	4
28	leaper182	4
29	ryokophoenix	4
30	swatkat24	4
31	descrime	4
32	hawkeyecat	4
33	krippity	3
34	nakannalee	3
35	shoedog	3
36	wildelamassu	3
37	a_to_zita	3
38	chiana606	3
39	imsanehonest	3
40	m_butterfly	2
41	stephantom	2
42	rubberbutton	2
43	evila_elf	2
44	bitter_crimson	2
45	annephoenix	2
46	tathren	2
47	chicating	2
48	topaz_eyes	2
49	amazonqueenkate	2
50	qween_tartii	2
51	jakob_sinister	2
52	supersaps	2

Total Commenters: 102 (47 not shown)
Total Comments: 1,477
Report generated 9/22/2006 10:02:44 PM by scrapdog's LJ Comment Stats Wizard 1.7

(I've excised all the one-comment-ers. It's too bad this doesn't take into account comments on my posts in other communities.) Not surprising that six of the top ten are people I know personally, including a sister and some very good friends. kabale still holds the top spot after enthusiastic participation in the Memoryfest. daasgrrl, my goodness, you've shot up quickly. thewlisian_afer, I like how we hold parallel spots in each other's graphs.

Next year on LJ, I hope to:

• Hold another Memoryfest for all and sundry, probably in January.
• Meet some of you lovelies who live within driving distance, and perhaps some who don't.
• Improve my commenting skills so I can say in one paragraph what it now takes four to cover.
• Write more.

And in that vein, it's time to work on those ficlets.

In the meantime, TELL ME on this day of reflection: How has LiveJournal affected your life? (How) have you changed your posting style since starting? Did you make promises to yourself that you've kept or broken? Etc. Fellow LJ addict wants to know.

Comments

[nightdog-barks.livejournal.com]

L'shanah tovah, bironic.

How has LiveJournal affected your life?

I think in two main ways -- I've gotten to know people I never would've met in RL -- folks in the UK, in France, Australia, Canada (lots of Canadians, for some reason!), Singapore, Switzerland ... the list goes on and on. And they're all "real people", even though I've never met them and I'm not likely to EVER meet them. I know more about some of these people than I know about my own relatives. Whether this is a good thing or bad remains to be seen.

Also. I've learned I can write. And apparently it's not too bad (I say it this way because I have a permanent inferiority complex ingrained in my personality). I still have trouble believing that I can make stuff up, write it down, and complete strangers like it enough to leave comments on it. That's just ... amazing to me. I am perplexed and have trouble believing it all just won't suddenly go away.

(How) have you changed your posting style since starting?

I think lately my personal posts have become shorter because I've been writing more.

Did you make promises to yourself that you've kept or broken?

Not that I know of.

[daasgrrl.livejournal.com]

Eep, do I talk that much? And of course, I have to post another comment in order to ask :)

LJ eats a lot of time - I tend to be a bit all-or-nothing so I sometimes feel like I 'have' to keep up with it more than I want to. But on the other hand, it's a fascinating little world unto itself.

[fallen-arazil.livejournal.com]

Yay! I made it on the list! ... only five though? I can do better, I promise!

Seriously, it's almost pathetic how much I feel like livejournal has enriched my life. Since I jumped into the House fandom with both feet in May, my f-list has gone from three ppl I know IRL to 24 ppl, 17 of them from House fandom, and all of them brilliant. I live in the suburbs in a teeny-tiny state, and there simply isn't enough ppl around here interested in the same things I'm interested in for me to fangirl with!

THe only way I might have changed my posting style is, since I got involved in fanfic, I'm a little less likely to post personal entries. I'm always thinking 'people friend my to read my fanfic, not to hear about my personal shit' =P

Woo-whoo! Liveljoural! *cheers*

~Djinn

*cracks knuckles and goes after comment #5*

[renoir-girl.livejournal.com]

How has LiveJournal affected your life? (How) have you changed your posting style since starting? Did you make promises to yourself that you've kept or broken?

LJ has had a huge impact. I started on LJ very briefly in the fall of 2002, but then took it up seriously in December of 2003. With thanks to the Lord of the Rings: Return of the King fandom, I got to know a bunch of great people and a couple of real asses, with of course an expected amount who fell between. One of them became one of the best friends I've ever had. I've also now got a gardening mentor who has inspired me to do so much more outside the house and away from the computer than I think I'd have ever done without her. So, yeah, people are the important part.

As for my posting style? Well, for awhile I tried to post like the people who turned out to be asses. I was posting something like ten times a day. Posted a lot of memes. Used LJ instead of e-mail to communicate with individuals. Now it's a lot more of a cross between a personal record and a way of sharing my questioning and explorations with people I trust.

I've never made promises to myself where LJ was concerned, although when I got trampled by one of the asses, it took me awhile to trust people again. Now I don't trust as quickly or expect much, but I've figured out a lot better how to deal with that 'getting to know you' time.

I used to think of myself as an LJ addict, but now it's just part of life. My friends are here. Some friends have wandered off, but I'm glad that I'm getting to know more. It's really very much like life anywhere else, though I find it's easier for me to just go ahead and "talk" here... chances seem better that I'll find someone who knows what I'm talking about. If I go to the Professional and Academic Women's Conference, I'm afraid they'll just talk about their careers or their kids or whatnot, and I doubt one person would have any idea what I was talking about if I mentioned that I watch House... So, yeah, I'm a bit more comfortable here.

[synn.livejournal.com]

I would love to see my own comment stats, but can't get it to show up formatted...
Being #6 is disappointing, but not really unexpected. Which leads into my thoughts on lj, and posting.
Here's some basic facts:
Joined: 2001-06-07 06:59:44 (I was working for the summer at the career development center -- long days w/ little to do, in an area rather far from all of my friends, with few people around in general. If I hadn't joined lj. I might have gone crazy.) Eilonwy was my first friend : )

Journal entries: 736 (divides to 147 or so a year, which surprised me.) I started by posting on a regular basis, b/c as mentioned, I would have gone crazy otherwise. Slowly, I realized I didn't really have anything to say. You know this, but my posting is based on my mood. When I'm happy I tend to post short tidbits about what's going on or things I find funny. When I'm stressed or angry I vent about it. When I'm depressed I tend to not post. usually. What's changed... well, several people friended me after 1:1, which is great, but since I figure they're probably interested in fandom or my fic, and not aimless ramblings about my rather dull life, I've started locking any non-fandom posts. That's about it.
I've tried reviews, and I've tried meta, but I'm really not good at either of those, and I can't ever seem to get through the post b4 deleting it.

Comments:
Posted: 935 - Received: 1,032

I'm terrible at responding to comments, so these numbers surprised me too. I expected a much greater discrepancy. um.
Comments are like akward social situations for me... you know when you hold a door for a stranger and they say 'no, you first' and it goes back and forth and no-one knows how to take it? it's like that. I never know when the comment conversation should end, and always feel as if I'm just rambling on to someone who's sitting at the other side thinking 'omg, do I have to answer this girl?'
And others I just don't have anything to say. For instance, I wanted to participate in every day of your memoryfest, but couldn't think of anything for most of the days, partially b/c I just didn't like most of the stuff I remembered, and partially b/c I have a terrible memory.

I don't know how many stories I've posted... somewhere between two and 6 or so, and three drabbles. Lately I've been trying to comment a bit more, but that's still really difficult. I've also been trying to write more. I'm working on a longer story, but am attempting to do drabbles in between just as little one-scene practice shots that make me feel like at least I've done something.
what else... I don't make promises to myself anymore, b/c I never keep them.
Have I gone on long enough?

[bell]

Hey! There's nothing wrong with putting two, three posts' worth of stuff in one! In fact, I rather like doing that, since I know my flist has a broad range of interests and by writing about multiple subjects, I'm more likely to irritate less people. XD

How has lj affected my life? *rolls eyes* Sucked up all my time, introduced me to new fandoms I definitely didn't need, shaken my faith in humanity, exposed me to sundry idiotic drama and wankery, and made me question what the hell I'm doing. (It's my fourth year on lj and my fifth blogging; you could say I've come disolusioned >D).

On the other hand, I've made dear friends, kept in contact with other friends who span at least three continents, learned about things I never imagined possible, found hours of entertainment, became more informed about different corners of the world, found pieces of (mostly fan)fiction that I fell in love with... in spite of what I said above, I'm not leaving lj anytime soon.

[nicocoer.livejournal.com]

I could have sworn I commented more then once. . .

~N~