LiveJournal

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LiveJournal
LiveJournal logo
The home page of LiveJournal, as seen on May 4, 2013.
The home page of LiveJournal, as seen on May 4, 2013.
URL http://livejournal.com
Status Endangered
Archiving status Upcoming...
Archiving type Unknown
Project source Discovery: livejournal-discovery; grab: livejournal-grab
Project tracker livejournaldisco
IRC channel #recordedjournal (on hackint)

LiveJournal is a blog community started by Brad Fitzpatrick back in 1999. It's changed hands a few times since then and the (huge) userbase has been pretty upset about how the new owners in Russia, SUP, are running the show. All the previous owners have had a potted history of banning people for fairly innocuous things.

In March 2016, ArchiveTeam started saving LiveJournal, "because it is very old, widely regarded as in decline, and has a lot of important stuff buried in it".[1]

Vital Signs

  • Many core pages (blog posts, etc.) are returning 505 errors.
  • 2025-12-29: Not everyone is eligible to post on LiveJournal. The ability to publish content is now reserved for verified accounts, registered bloggers, and those who have high Social Capital score to improve content quality.[2]
  • 2010-07-14: LiveJournal has purged suspended accounts and inactive journals (not logged for 24 months straight and has 1 post) and communities (not logged for 24 months straight and has 1 entry and no comments).[3]
  • 2009-01-08: Some San Fransisco employees have been laid off amid a company restructuring.[4][5][6][7]

Site structure to extract active profiles

The site has a variety of addresses and each journal is hosted on the subdomain of the main site. e.g. the7days.livejournal.com but these can be found by checking their feed via this address ext-NUMBER.livejournal.com/feed/ This method yeards 3.5 million hits. The site also has a profile page for each user too www.livejournal.com/profile?userid=1&t=I This method yields 77 million profiles.

Scrape of profile is ongoing.

Once all the ext-NUMBER have been found, they will be converted to the subdomains if the user has a journal on the site.

There is a 2 part scrape happening 1. ext-NUMBER 2. profile page

Backup Tools

  • Antennapedia (Mac OS X out-of-the-box support, needs Python where missing) - For migrating journal entries from any LJ-style server to any other LJ-style server.
  • ljArchive (Windows only) - A nice interface grabs the info from the servers and presents it in its own customizable templates within the program. Exports to HTML and XML. It's very easy to use and is currently being developed on Sourceforge.
  • LJbook (Currently overloaded) - Web interface exports LJ to a PDF suitable for printing on Lulu or just backing up, with images and other options. Limited use per month for unpaid users.
  • ljdump (Python) slurps everything down into a pile of XML files.
  • Wordpress.com can import entire LiveJournals, including comments. Not sure if it's also available in the standalone Wordpress software, or only the hosted service.
  • XJournal (Mac OS X only) can download all entries.
  • LJMirgate (Python) can archive the entire journal, and optionally migrate to another LJ-based site like InsaneJournal or Dreamwidth.
  • ljdump (Python) dumps to HTML, and can output the format expected by the Wordpress LJ import plugin.

How to help if you have lists of URLs

For other ArchiveTeam projects that can use this kind of help, see Projects requiring URL lists.

This project requires lists of URLs for content on the target website. If you have a source of URLs, please:

  1. If the list exceeds a few megabytes, compress it, preferably using zstd -10.
  2. Give the file a descriptive name and upload it to https://transfer.archivete.am/.
  3. Share the resulting URL in the project IRC channel.
    • If you wish your list to remain private, please get in touch with a channel op (e.g. arkiver or JustAnotherArchivist). Items generated from your list will still be processed publicly, but they will be mixed in with all other items and channel logs will not associate them with you.

ArchiveBot

Archiving individual LiveJournal sites with ArchiveBot is being co-ordinated via the archivebot-livejournal Etherpad page. The -i dreamwidth -u firefox -c 1 -d 2000 options should be used.

Bans give 403 errors and last for around one month.

External links

References

  1. ↑ by user:JesseW (http://archive.fart.website/bin/irclogger_log/archiveteam-bs?date=2016-03-07,Mon&sel=188#l184)
  2. ↑ LiveJournal: важные изменения and related threads on Bluesky [1] [2]
  3. ↑ Notifications, Purged Accounts, Stats, TxtLJ, Gulf_Aid_Now (Jul. 14, 2010 news:update "One of the benefits of the work we've done to purge suspended accounts is that we will now be able to purge inactive journals and communities too--something you've been requesting for years! A journal is defined as inactive if it has not been logged into for 24 consecutive months. A community is defined as inactive if has not been updated for 24 consecutive months. A journal is defined as inactive if it has not been logged into for 24 consecutive months and has only one post (i.e., the welcome post). A community is defined as inactive if has not been updated for 24 consecutive months and has only one entry and no comments. Once an account is eligible to be purged for inactivity, the owner will be sent an email to alert them of the inactive status. The owner will then have two weeks to log into the journal or post to their community to prevent it from being deleted. If the owner does not log in or post, the account will be delete..."
  4. ↑ Changes at LJ HQ (Jan. 8, 2009 news:update) "The restructuring is done with an eye to the future to ensure the long-term viability of LiveJournal as a business. As a team, we know that LJ has a great future as it prepares for its second decade." - "We recently invested a considerable amount on all-new server equipment and a facility in Montana to house it all as part of our commitment to the longevity of LJ." - "We will be around for years to come and we're committed to ensuring that your journals, friends pages, and communities will be, too."
  5. ↑ Livejournal Implodes: Staff Let Go
  6. ↑ [http://community.livejournal.com/no_lj_ads/83519.html LJ in 2009 -- The Grim Purge
  7. ↑ The Russian Bear Slashes a Social Network
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