Jamie Peters

07:56 pm: Suggestions
Hey folks!

Post your suggestions for improvements here. Support requests (like stuff that's broken) still go to support.

This will help me keep all the suggestions in one place! :)

Tags: suggestions

11:54 am: About This Journal
Many of my posts are about ideas and are intended to gather opinions from our users. I must stress that my stating that we have an idea that we want to implement does not mean it is going to happen right away. There are several reasons for this:

1) I am not a developer. I have very little knowledge about time and feasibility of coding new features.
2) Our developers are all working on Inksome in addition to their regular jobs and their responsibilities to family and friends.
3) Sometimes, an idea that looks awesome is actually a monster to code.
4) Our main goal is to always see the most basic functions of the site working, so if there's something that needs to be fixed, it comes first.

When we are ready to launch a new feature it will be in the news feed. That's where the official stuff is. I speak for Inksome but in this journal, I'm mostly bouncing ideas off the userbase. You should be able to tell if I'm announcing something officially but NEVER assume. Ask if you need to.

Thanks for reading! :)

Jamie

Tags: administrative, inksome

01:48 pm: The first in a series about Inksome and Fandom
Disclaimer: I am an unapologetic fangirl, but no kind of BNF.

staff_kit and I were talking about role playing communities today and things that IS could do to create a better experience on IS for role playing.

Here are some of the (admittedly few) things I know about role playing on journaling sites.

ETA: mysticshell has educated me on storyline development here.

* There are usually two comms: one for the story and one for OOC stuff and admin.
* Each character has a user journal.
* Players develop storylines outside of the main comm or their characters' journals. Once they have one, then they post.
* Comments are generally conversations, often decided ahead of time.
* The biggest games have websites where they keep "the story so far."

Here are some ideas we have that could create a better rp-ing experience.

Stuff that everyone will appreciate:

* Improved comment thread expansion, maybe customizable
* The ability to display the most recent comments or the most recently updated thread in a post.
* Simplified and clarified timestamping.
* An increased character limit on usernames.

So, how does that last one make things more awesome? Listen to this. In any given fandom, but especially the big ones, there are MANY rp games in play. BUT each new iteration of a character needs a unique name. With longer usernames, rp-ers could use the format: XXX_Character, where XXX is a brief abbreviation for the game. So, in a Harry Potter future role play game about the new generation called The New Hogwarts Generation, the character names would be NHG_Character (Kit tells me that usernames will remain NOT case sensitive). This means that each game has Harry as a character without having to come up with increasingly more silly ways of saying "I'm Harry!"

Stuff that will benefit role playing groups (and will cost money):

* A reserved block of usernames with the comm's abbreviation. Every username created with that group's XXX will be a character in your game.
* 50 invites to use for character players or additional comms
* A paid IS community (which means the ability to customize it to your heart's content)
* 500 MB of webspace on IS's server to create a "Story So Far," the list of available characters, and all the OOC stuff in a way that avoids some of the inconveniences of such info being buried in a community journal.
The above service would cost $50 per year. That's the regular $35 for a paid user plus $15 for the username block, invites, and webspace. We think this a great deal.

Still to come, a post about fanfiction and a post about our mission.

I encourage replies from anyone on this post. Is there something you always wished would be easier in rp-ing? Let me know! I only ask that if you have an IS account, you SIGN IN and that if you do not and post anonymously, you SIGN YOUR POST (preferably with something like John Doe on IJ). This is so I can contact you if necessary (cause I might want more of your advice!).

Tags: fandom, inksome, mission, roleplaying

11:04 am: Cross-Posted from Personal Journal
This post is directed at folks who think that Kit has "bent over
backwards to make anons work" (Anonymous comment in News).

I wouldn't say that Kit has done this. In fact, Kit has had many
conversations with his team of volunteers and his wife (ME!) about how
to handle anons and complaints about it.

In the end, he decided that as long as they continue to delete
comments when requested to, they are holding up their end of the
bargain.

Think about it: you know where the anonymous comments are being
posted, so you only have to look in a couple of places to check that
some random person is violating your privacy. If anons is suspended,
dozens of new anon comments communities will pop up and you might not
know where they all are.

People abuse the internet and have since it began. Site owners can
either be censorious (like LiveJournal) or they can have a policy that
encourages free speech.

Voltaire said, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the
death your right to say it." This is the kind of atmosphere we
(Inksome, and I believe that I have the right to talk policy since I
help Kit make decisions) are trying to create.

I've also read that people (and there are no links to evidence this
has actually happened) have had to change their phone numbers. Here's
a few things everyone can do to protect their personal information.

1) NEVER give out your real name and stuff to people you don't trust.
This means that friends-locking isn't always enough. You may have to
use a custom filter.

2) Realize that if you decide to post your personal info (including
pictures) in such a way that it can be accessed by people you don't
trust, you have taken on that risk yourself. This isn't to say that a
person taking that info and abusing it is free of guilt, but it is NOT
the same level as, say, a nurse doing this. There are no privacy
guarantees on the internet, period.

3) Let me say that again: There are no privacy guarantees on the
internet.

Finally, please remember that Inksome is for adults. That means that
we need to recognize our rights AND our responsibilities. Think twice
before posting or commenting. The people making anon comments that
are stupid, mean, and invasive are acting like kids. They will
eventually be punished like kids. It won't be Inksome that punishes
them but remember that karma will kick their ass one day. Don't
stoop to their level!