The real problem with collaborative fiction is finding collaborators who aren't idiots, and then getting good work out of it. The "article" linked was stilted and the humor was inane.
Sure, there are projects suited to live collaboration. Screenplays, songs, even blog fiction(self plug). But prose narrative is one of the least likely. Name one good novel that was written by committee.
The "vast majority" of any group of people are idiots. But that doesn't discount the hundreds of LJers whose daily writings I find entertaining and thought-provoking.
Sure. But that doesn't mean they picked the best tool. LJ doesn't discourage brilliance, but it doesn't really offer anything to enable brilliance. What it enables, with its unique feature set, is melodrama.
I will say one good thing about LiveJournal: the viral nature of their community makes it much easier to build an audience for your blog. All you have do is pick a few other LJers' sites and start commenting, and they're more likely start reading yours. This is how it works in the wider world of blogdom too, of course (including to some degree Slashdot), but the "friends" structure somewhat formalizes the process and encourages people to do it proactively. Of course, the quality of your audience will depend on the quality of the sites you choose to comment on.
The vast majority of LiveJournal users use it as a sort of melodrama aggregator. It's got all the features of a standard blog, and adds stickers on your locker (avatars), mood rings, and a "friends list" with all the emotional baggage and infighting that entails. It's like being in middle school forever.
Note that I'm not against blogs. I honestly think blogs are transformative, and I'm having fun with my own experiment. But for the people who pick LiveJournal for their blog, the reason is almost certainly because all their friends are already on it. If that's not the case for you, you may find it a lonely and somewhat confusing place. (Again, like middle school.)
Slashdot Mirror
Sure, there are projects suited to live collaboration. Screenplays, songs, even blog fiction (self plug). But prose narrative is one of the least likely. Name one good novel that was written by committee.
Sure. But that doesn't mean they picked the best tool. LJ doesn't discourage brilliance, but it doesn't really offer anything to enable brilliance. What it enables, with its unique feature set, is melodrama.
I will say one good thing about LiveJournal: the viral nature of their community makes it much easier to build an audience for your blog. All you have do is pick a few other LJers' sites and start commenting, and they're more likely start reading yours. This is how it works in the wider world of blogdom too, of course (including to some degree Slashdot), but the "friends" structure somewhat formalizes the process and encourages people to do it proactively. Of course, the quality of your audience will depend on the quality of the sites you choose to comment on.
The vast majority of LiveJournal users use it as a sort of melodrama aggregator. It's got all the features of a standard blog, and adds stickers on your locker (avatars), mood rings, and a "friends list" with all the emotional baggage and infighting that entails. It's like being in middle school forever. Note that I'm not against blogs. I honestly think blogs are transformative, and I'm having fun with my own experiment. But for the people who pick LiveJournal for their blog, the reason is almost certainly because all their friends are already on it. If that's not the case for you, you may find it a lonely and somewhat confusing place. (Again, like middle school.)