Notes augmented

We've enhanced and de-bugged Notes. If you haven't tried it yet, now's the time! You can create a private note when you ban multiple users. You can also delete multiple notes at once. Lastly, paid users have the option to add a note (visible only to you) whenever you add or remove a friend (guaranteed to avoid embarrassing social mishaps). If you don't currently have a paid account, you can upgrade now! It only takes a few minutes and costs less than a bad shopping mall haircut (plus, it's way more fashionable)!

Product tweaks and bug kill

1. In another effort to zap spam, comments containing links from domains LiveJournal deems untrustworthy are now automatically screened
2. If you sign up to get notifications of the Writer's Block question of the day, you'll now see the daily question in the email notification, so you'll have a little extra time to ponder before you post. You can subscribe to Writers Block notifications here
3. The issue causing random comments to vanish has been fixed!
4. If you visit a LiveJournal page and get prompted to log in, you'll be returned to the same page after you sign in (Thanks, Dreamwidth)!
5. If you don't edit the timestamp for an entry at all, the entry timestamp will indicate the time the entry was posted instead of the time the Update Journal page was loaded
6. Comments with paddings/backgrounds render correctly within the comment box (and will no longer wrap outside the box and break frames/margins)

New FCK fixes rich text editor!

1. We've updated our RTE (Rich Text Editor) to FCKeditor version 2.6.5
2. When switching from the RTE to HTML editor, links for syndicated feeds are no longer broken
3. RTE now functions properly in Safari 4.0
4. An extra line/space will not be auto-inserted whenever you switch from RTE to HTML editor
5. The insert image link now works correctly in all browsers

LiveJournal Cares

We’re pleased to introduce you to lj_cares, a new LiveJournal community dedicated to raising awareness and funds for U.S. charitable organizations that improve the health and well-being of people around the world. Each month, we’ll spotlight a nonprofit that is making a significant global impact through medical research, public outreach, and/or humanitarian social programs. Charities will be selected in accordance with the U.S. calendar of national health observances based on a high rating (of over 60%) on Charity Navigator and global scope of impact.

In this, our inaugural month of November, we will celebrate national adoption month by offering a charitable virtual gift (priced at $2.99) to support Love Without Boundaries, an organization that saves the lives of orphans with life-threatening diseases and places them in loving homes around the world. LiveJournal will donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of charitable vgifts (we'll cover the cost of credit card transaction fees). To learn more about Love Without Boundaries, please visit lj_cares and read about how they helped save Baby Kang and the Rainbow Twins from fatal illnesses, who are now thriving in nurturing families. You can purchase your Love Without Boundaries gifts in the Virtual Gift shop.

Papered in postcards

A couple of weeks ago, we asked you to send in postcards to surround us with LiveJournal community. Thanks for coming through! We've received postcards all the way from Germany, Finland, and Canada and from all over the US, including Texas, Florida, Alaska, Montana, Wyoming, Indiana, Hawaii, and Oklahoma just to name just a handful. We're thrilled with our improved decor.

Please keep the love coming for one more week by writing to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be drawing the names of ten random contributors next Thursday to win paid account credits!

Photos of the week

We have more dazzling images posted by talented LiveJournal photographers from around the world. We're hoping to span the entire globe, so please continue posting and tagging. Of course, you can also sit back and enjoy the view at lj_photophile.

You can see a sample of this week's gorgeous photos and check out spotlight communities and awesome user content after the jump!

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Curtains

We thank you, once again, for joining us. See you next week!

EDIT@08:16 UTC/GMT. Wow. That was ugly. I expected it to go for 30 minutes and have maybe 1 minute of broken connectivity. Instead it lasted over 4 hours and we had 10 minutes of downtime directly related to the load balancer upgrades and then another 5-10 minutes of downtime when our primary Pingback database server crashed and the secondary couldn't take over; which could have been indirectly caused by the network upgrade missing a self-VIP.

Anyways, we're up, we're working, the load balancers are barely breaking a sweat right now and I need some food and a shot of whiskey. I don't even *like* whiskey!!

Thanks mhwest and dnewhall for helping out!

---

On Saturday the 14th at 4AM UTC/GMT we will be upgrading the operating system of our network load balancers to a newer version, one that will allow us to use both CPUs! Nifty, because multiprocessing is nice.

Since we have 2 load balancers, the plan is to upgrade 1 at a time, and there really should be very little impact to our website. Hopefully you won't notice a thing and I'll get to go back to the hotel and watch some wonderful late night infomercials.

We've got a lot of exciting projects coming up for 2010 and we're hoping that we'll be able to deliver them all to you, that you will find it useful/cool/lovely and then you will use the site even more. Behind-the-scenes work like this will give us the capacity to handle the anticipated traffic, so expect a few more maintenance windows especially in the beginning of next year as we've got some neat ideas to improve performance around here! We had the recent 30-45 minute outage yesterday due to one of our logging databases filling up disk space -- not so great design coupled with my human error in handling the initial problem -- and it looks like we're going to finally have some resources to eliminate stuff like that. I can't wait!

As usual, I will be updating status.livejournal.org before and after, just in case you are not able to reach our main website during the work.

sixwordstories
Whether you're in the mood for a creative challenge or you're short on time or attention span, this semi-addictive community is perfect for those who find flash fiction way long. Once you get the hang of it, you won't be able to stop. The prince turned into a frog. The girl ran home to mother. Tough to write. Easy to read. It's a double threesome of fun.

dailyfoodie
Delicious, ambitious, and occasionally nutritious dishes make for an eclectic, all-you-can-eat feast. Whether you're searching for recipes for your next dinner party or you're jonesing for a late-night brownie fix, your cravings are sure to be well sated. A warm and inclusive community that welcomes all orientations, from carnivores to vegans, from gourmands to junk-food junkies. Guaranteed bias-free, food-positive, and pan-epicurian.

Basket Case left about five minutes before the groceries (including what apparently was a bulk shipment of leeks) arrived. Prior to that, I spent an hour sitting on my couch, not blowing up super mutants and ghouls, listening while she alternately wept and expounded on her anxiety and general overwhelmedness.

She did talk to both a psychologist and one of the peer counselors, so I don't feel like it's okay to yell at her for interrupting what had, until then, been a very satisfying 'splody-fest. She even admitted that she feels bad for just venting like this (it seems she's been doing this to other people) and she wishes she could just stop feeling so anxious.

I'll give her a pass today, since she did talk to the shrink and she's trying to implement whatever strategies were suggested. I did feel the need to point out to her that the whole getting better thing won't happen instantaneously. She had been lamenting how she had felt better immediately after talking with the shrink, but as the day went on the anxiety crept back in or something. What sort of miracle was she expecting? It doesn't work like that.

So I'm just going to wait and see how this progresses. If it looks like she's going to make a habit of giving me these impromptu (and unsolicited) status updates, I will firmly but politely (well, as polite as I can be) point out that I'm not her counselor. If she needs to go talk to the shrink every day, I think she should do that. Or whatever keeps her off my proverbial couch.

But it makes me uncomfortable for her to just walk in, sit down and start dumping all her bullshit in my lap when I never even asked her to. I think I've had this minor headache off and on all day because I've been wondering when it was going to happen. When was I going to have to listen to her vent today? Not only does it make me uncomfortable, I find myself torn between listening with as little comment and interaction as possible in the hopes that she'll get it out of her system and go away and wanting to just agree with her when she suggests that maybe she's not ready for this and she should quit just to get her to go away.

Of course, she'd cry more if I said that, and we all know how Jackie feels about weepy people.

I said I'd be more patient with her if she sought help, and she's doing that, so I'll try to look sympathetic but not enough to encourage more sharing, at least for the next few days. Maybe after this next test on Monday she'll calm the fuck down and start being normal again for a little while.

Why couldn't I have gotten a normal person to live with? Was that really too much to ask?

And if she ambushes me again pre-coffee, all bets are off.

It's a good thing I love the leek potato soup because I seem to have ordered a lot more leeks than I thought I was going to get.

The empire strikes back

In recent weeks, we've taken huge steps towards blocking spam accounts on LiveJournal. In fact, we've suspended as many as 30,000 accounts in a single day! We've implemented several pre-emptive measures to prevent the creation of spam accounts, and we've honed our detection of suspicious content. Spam bots are a crafty lot, so we'll continue to refine our tactics and keep up the good fight to keep you safe from spam attacks on LiveJournal.

RSS feeds again

If you're addicted to xkcd_rss, icanhaschzbrgr, or other syndicated feeds, we're pleased to report that we've resolved the update error that was mucking up your RSS feeds. While content was being pulled correctly, it wasn't being posted to the feeds themselves. Late last week, we finally nailed down what we hope was the root problem, so content should post properly. We thank you for your patience.

Wii have killer CSI Deadly Intent contests!

c_s_i

If you're a gamer who loves CSI, have Wii got news for you! c_s_i is sponsoring killer contests. Simply post a question to a member of the CSI crew. The winner will get a free copy of CSI: Deadly Intent for Nintendo Wii (with a retail value of $39.99) and get their question answered by a member of the CSI writing team! There's also a fantastic monthly contest. To enter, join c_s_i, play the online version of CSI: Deadly Intent, and respond to a two-part query for a chance to win a Wii! Entries will be judged on composition and originality. Sorry, but you must be a U.S. resident and over 18 years old to participate. Check out the rules here.

Enveloped in postcards

Last week, we asked you to send in postcards to help us decorate our drab concrete walls. Here's a photo of the results so far! Thank you so much and please keep them coming! You can mail them to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be giving ten random users paid account credits.

Photos of the week

If you haven't visited our new LiveJournal photo community, you're in for an amazing visual trip. LiveJournal users from around the world will take you on a scenic journey to everywhere. Post your own pictures or kick back and enjoy at lj_photophile. You can view some of this week's awesome photos after the jump. Please start tagging with geographic location, since we'd like to track all the places around the world represented in this community. Keep on commenting too!
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While I'm waiting for the water for my coffee to boil? You waited a whole 45 seconds after I get out of bed to ambush me with your sob story about how you're so panicky about your upcoming test that you didn't sleep? Well, I did. I slept like a baby, and I'd like to wake up now.

I asked her if she made an appointment with the counseling office, and she replied that she'll try to go today after a tutoring something or other this afternoon. And that right there tells me that she doesn't want to talk to a counselor. On some level, she must want to be all pathetic and have everyone feel sorry for her. Two things in her reply and one thing from outside that statement all tell me this.

1. She did not do this yesterday.
2. She said she'll try.
3. She said she'll try to go sometime this afternoon.

No, she should've gone yesterday. The next best thing at this moment is to go immediately after biochem is over at ten. It's just in the next building. It would only take five minutes to get there from class. (Most offices open at nine, and I'm not about to suggest Basket Case miss class. She's doing badly enough while going to every lecture.)

(I wonder if I can go to the counseling center and talk to someone about how my roommate is driving me nuts with her refusal to get help and her insistence on treating me like an impromptu sounding board.)

Basket Case is from now on being subjected to the .... what do you call it? It's a certain look you give people that says, "Oh, I'm saying I agree with you on how much this sucks but I really don't care." And that's about all the communication I can muster up before I even have my first cup of coffee.

Basket Case is living up to her nickname. Out of the blue this morning she burst into tears about how she thinks she failed this test we just took and she knows she's going to do horrible on the test she has on Monday. She says she's not able to eat anything because of the anxiety, and that it's affecting her sleep also.

Poor thing. I listened while she vented and then suggested that maybe she should talk to a counselor or something. That's about the extent of my being sympathetic. I'm okay with bitching and whining about stuff that isn't important, but I think you need to take an active role in fixing things that are truly wrong.

I don't think her crying to me (who thinks I'm sympathetic, anyway?) is going to help solve this problem she has, and hearing about almost the exact same thing (but with a little more drama this time) as what happened with the last test really makes me disinclined to want to hold her hand and reassure her that she does belong here. Maybe she doesn't. If she can't handle taking a few classes and passing some tests, how is she going to function when she has to write grants and give seminars and try to publish the next great discovery before someone else does? At first I thought it was just a communication issue. She's not a very effective communicator, so while she probably knows the material, she just sucks at conveying it to others. Now, after seeing a full-on breakdown over a plate of waffles that she couldn't make herself eat (who can't eat waffles?), I think it's more of an inability to handle stress. That tells me that she needs to talk to someone, not see another tutor.

I listened and suggested contacting the peer network or even the actual counseling office for some help. And I think this is going to be the last sort of sympathy she's going to get from me on the matter. I'm not going to pat her on the back and tell her she'll be all right. I don't believe it will be all right. And this was an escalation over what she was like after the first test. We went from just nervous/anxious bathering to tears in just a few weeks. What's next?

aiyatheydidnt
The Chinese version of ONTD, AIYA is a dynamic international community that welcomes users who share a love of contemporary Chinese pop culture. Dedicated to celebrity gossip and entertainment news, you'll enjoy gorgeous photos and breaking stories featuring the glitterati of mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.

wendylady2
Designed to rescue fashion victims everywhere, this Brit-based community reads like a rag-ezine. Published once or twice weekly, you'll view bizarre highlights of the global fashion scene through captivating photos and delightfully snarky editorial. Sit tight for a virtual fashion tour from the runways of New York to Milan to Paris and back home again to London in homage to the adage: you can't buy good taste.

soldiers_heart
A passionate community for veterans of all ages (mostly American), plus families, friends, and supporters. View poignant snapshots detailing life in combat and back on civilian soil in the form of original artwork, personal narratives, poetry, and photos. Be forewarned that members don't shy away from describing their disappointments, disabilities, and struggles.