Cosmo Digital

The second "blog" site I looked at was Livejournal.com. The Web Log I eventually created is entitled Wretched Words. I chose this site because one of my friends uses it for her journal, and reccomended it to me. However, I did not immediately sign up, instead first researching the site. The very first thing I did was read the Terms of Service. Much like Blogger.com, the TOS page was rather difficult to find, and the site only displayed it partially into the registration process. With this site, however, it is presented as an actual embedded document, instead of just a link, thus increasing the chance that people will actually read the agreement.

It was near the end of this document where I suddently realized just how similar the Terms of Service for Livejournal.com and Blogger.com really are. Although the company names and such are all different, there are some areas that are literally identical. For example, the Member Conduct section (section XVI) on Livejournal holds some startling similarities to the one at Blogger.com (section 4 of the Blogspot TOS).

Compare these sections of text. The first is taken from section 4 (Member Conduct) of the Blogspot TOS.

You agree to not use the Service to: (a) upload, post or 
otherwise transmit any Content that is unlawful, harmful,
threatening, abusive, harassing, tortious, defamatory, 
vulgar, obscene, libelous, invasive of another's privacy,
hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

This next selection is taken from the Member Conduct section of the Livejournal TOS. Notice the similarities.

You agree to NOT use the Service to:

   1. Upload, post or otherwise transmit any content that 
is in LiveJournal.com's opinion to be unlawful, harmful, 
threatening, abusive, harassing, tortious, defamatory, vulgar,
obscene, libelous, invasive to another's privacy (up to, but 
not excluding any address, email, phone number, or any other 
contact information with out the written consent of the owner
of such information), hateful, or racially, ethnically or 
otherwise objectionable;

Of these two selections, over half the the Livejournal entry is identical to the Blogger.com entry, even in the order in which the words such as unlawful, harmful, and threatening, are presented. This is similar throughout the rest of the Member Conduct sections as well, with the only difference being that, much like above, Livejournal adds in some occasional extra content. Another example is below.

Upload, post or otherwise transmit any content that you do not
have a right to transmit under any law or under contractual or 
fiduciary relationships (such as inside information, 
proprietary and confidential information learned or disclosed
as part of employment relationships or under nondisclosure 
agreements);

This section of text is completely identical on both sites, even the parenthetical text. Furthermore, this section includes the phrase "contractual or fiduciary relationships", which to me is a rather uncommon phrase. These identical phrases would seem to confirm, in my mind at least, that these Terms of Service agreements are all taken from a single standard template, and changed only slightly for each individual site. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing. It points out, however, that you will be agreeing to roughly the same things for either one of these sites. I am interested in seeing how Myspace.com will stack up against these results.

Anyway, on to the site itself.

Signing up for the site takes a slightly longer amount of time than Blogger.com, and also requires age verification (View Screenshot). Unlike my experience with Blogger.com, this one does send a confirmation e-mail to the address which you entered while registering. (View Screenshot). When this is complete, the next page brings up a series of forms while you are able to fill out an alarming amount of personal information, although the site says that the majority of this is optional, although you still must enter your birthdate once more, as well as location information such as state and zip code. (View Screenshot) Even though much of this information is optional, it is clear that statistics are compiled based on the information you give them, as is seen in their Statistics Page.

Beneath this are the options with which you can slightly customize your journal. I was actually suprised at the amount of options which I was given, numbering far more than Blogger had. I was specifically suprised at the amount of options it gave for managing user comments, such as whether I wanted to log the IP addresses of commenters. (View Screenshot) Once this is finished, a "Success" screen comes up, which states your settings have been updated.

So, although I now had a web log on Livejournal, I wanted to customize it. After looking around in the top menu, I found a "customize" link.


This took me to a page where I could select a layout, language, template, etc. Although rather basic, it also provides a link to a page where you can change individual settings, such as colors (View Screenshot). This is a nice feature, and notably one which is lacking in Blogger.com unless you manually edit their templates. However, true template customization is not allowed, as that is a feature that is only available for paid accounts, which I am unwilling to get. Thus, although I can edit colors, fonts, and background images, I am still locked into the standard template which I selected.

The closest thing I could get to for a title image was a User Image, of which Livejournal allows up to six (or more if you pay for the site). However, this image is limited in size, as it can not be over 100 by 100 pixels or over a certain size (40 kb). However, at least this small image displays up in the top square of the web log, unlike anything I was able to do with Blogger.com that did not involve hacking the template.

Thus, while Livejournal does offer some customization with things like fonts and colors, it locks all free users into their template and prevents any real "hands on" editing with things such as CSS or XML. However, for someone who is fine with the template, this site is suitable.

Continue to Next Page