#i want to have one big mish mash all channels blaring at once social hub

[magpiemirroring]

this is one of the things I miss about livejournal. sure, people would (innocently or not) misread things, but you did have communities with rules and guidelines that would make it clear that this is the Venting About Fandom Community. This is An RP Community. This is An Activist Group. And posting about other things there would be off-topic. You could have communities open to everyone and communities that only existed for the person running it and the people they invited and or approved.

likewise, you could control who saw you posts on your journal. You could categorize a post so that only your IRL friends could read it. You could have another category for private posts. You could have one that was just for you and one friend. Etc. Think of a way you might what to segment up your readers and you could do that.

tumblr has tags at least, but they aren't super visible on all layouts and even when they are visible are not prominent in the visual hierarchy so no matter how carefully you tag for "vent post" or "joke" or "i'm just having some feelings" its possible to get a response from someone reacting intensely to your words without even seeing the hints about context or intent in the tags.

which isn't to say that livejournal was totally better. there's lots I do like about tumblr's tags and ability to circulate posts, and I have appreciated the small increase in control over posts that they have added!

I just miss the days where our social hubs online were more often little clearly labeled boxes and it didn't have to feel like I was trying to hold a job interview, a vent session with friends, an activist meeting, an art show, a fandom club discussion about the latest whatever, and a critical media analysis all in the same meeting room.

unfortunately social media puts the activist meeting, the bitching session, the public outreach, the group therapy session, the silly blow off some steam gossiping about people private chat, and the group d&d session all in the same place, and so people mistake, for example, an outpouring of legitimate grief and rage as somehow a public-facing political statement, or a carefully edited and tactical political statement as a reflection of a person's most deeply held private feelings, etc