Open Beta speculations!

[foxfirefey]

Open Beta is...dundundun...tomorrow!

Here is your post to speculate on what's going to happen. Do you think seed accounts are going to sell fast or slow? What kind of drama is going to erupt when the flood gates are open? Are you expecting to drag people over now that the gates are open more, or are people you know banging to get in?

Comments

[naraht]

I'm getting the impression that seed accounts are going to sell out in about fifteen minutes. I could be wrong though... it might be five.

Most of my friends have got accounts through the OpenID lottery already, which is cool.

[foxfirefey]

I...I like this icon of yours!

[naraht]

Thank you! It's from a piece by Dave Hilliard, whose website I can't find right now...

Wild speculation!

[helens78]

Oo, speculation! :D

I think seed accounts are going to sell out within an hour of the sale opening, while paid accounts start coming in strong, tapering off after the burst, and then increasing steadily over the next 12 hours. After the second seed account sale -- which I think is going to sell out even faster than the first, say within 45 minutes -- we'll get another big burst of paid accounts (for everyone who was trying to get a seed account and didn't make it in time), and I think the rush to create paid accounts is going to taper off within five or so days. /end speculation

Drama: I don't know! I haven't seen enough drama to be able to guess. I would imagine that a lot of people are going to be like me: surrounded by squee that builds on itself. :) However, some people will be annoyed, and there will be internal drama of the "WTF, this place was supposed to supply free naked massage therapists and bacon -- where the hell's my bacon?" type. Some people will also pitch fits about seed accounts, and you'll see people saying that since they couldn't get a seed account, they're not going to use DW at all (and then turn right around and create an account, or be posting from a free or even paid account when they say it.)

However, I think the full "let's all move in" rush is going to be at least a month in the making. People will want to import stuff and the importer will get backed up; people will have lots of style tweaks they want to make (but I anticipate getting quite a few more styles within a week or two of open beta). Comms will be springing up like bunnies for at least the first month, with the bulk of them happening right at open beta opening, and a great deal of them happening in the week or so after, tapering to a "normal" level the week after that.

Last but not least, I'm going to have to take bets on how many dreamsheep will get added to the flock in the month after open beta. :D :D :D I think I might have to do some kind of sheep-creating contest. :D

Re: Wild speculation!

[foxfirefey]

Oh man I have seeeeeen DW drama already, let me tell you.

There's the elitism crew: since DW with its invite codes is exclusive, and thus like those mean cool kids in school, and in groups are inherently suspect, they despise the thought of coming here.

There's the people upset with denise/LJ Abuse and thus dislike Dreamwidth, since she's one of the owners.

There's the people who have problems with legomymalfoy just being listed on the Volunteers in Waiting page on the wiki--I had to disable open editing there because they kept vandalizing it.

There are people who hate DW because people are going to it and they don't want to, and feel like they'll be forced to follow.

There's the disabling comments on crossposts fluffle.

There was the community import wailing.

There's a lot of people who assume DW is a fandom project by fans, for fans who then proceed to criticize it on merits that do not match what they believe a fandom project should have.

I think there's going to be drama about the username landgrab.

Re: Wild speculation!

[telesilla]

Like I was saying to Hels, I think the wank will get uglier for a while, as more people are going to be squeeing over DW on LJ.

I managed to miss the bit about legomymalfoy but I can't say I'm surprised. People on the internets can really hold grudges.

Re: Wild speculation!

[helens78]

Oh, oh, I've seen it and heard of it -- I meant that it isn't showing up in my primary reading areas, thank heavens. I've dodged the spooge bullet for this and I am glad, glad, glad!

I think there's going to be drama about the username landgrab.

Now this I hadn't thought about, but OH YEAH. That's going to cause some issues right there.

Re: Wild speculation!

[orexisbella.livejournal.com]

Just curious - I think I missed the community import wailing. Is it not going to be possible to import a community? *confused*

Re: Wild speculation!

[foxfirefey]

There are several social and technological barriers to the import of communities, basically:

* It's harder to justify the fair use of importing posts from a community versus things like comments. There are people out there who are upset that they can't import communities, but there are also a lot of people out there who would be upset if we did, as well.
* We currently import things as OpenID users, so people can still have control over their content. But, OpenID users cannot make posts, so we can't post as them to a community without backend changes. And if we import posts and tag them as OpenID, then there'd be a lot of confusion from OpenID users who would think that would mean they could post.

There are proposals and suggestions around this, but chances are wholesale importing of a community (short of single poster communities, perhaps) isn't going to happen.

Re: Wild speculation!

[beck_liz]

I saw at least one person who thought the $200 seed account was the only paid option - so there's a lot of misinformation out there, no matter how good people have been about spreading the word, and therefore, a lot of wank about it. On top of the wank that isn't misinformation-based.

Re: Wild speculation!

[matgb]

And one of my FL was annoyed that she kept missing the invite codes due to her online time being weird.

As soon as someone told her she could pay directly, she jumped over here straight away. I always forget that "well informed" has so many different levels within the sub set.

Re: Wild speculation!

[telesilla]

I'd say you're right on the money about all this.

I don't think there will be much NEW drama, although maybe a little about the limited number of seed accounts. I think we'll see an increase and maybe more bitter versions of the wanks foxfirefey mentions below. Sadly, I don't think the anger and misinformation campaigns are going to go away any time soon.

And you totally need to do a Dreamsheep contest. I had another idea, but it's more complicated than just pasting on (yay!) a graphic.

Re: Wild speculation!

[helens78]

You know I always wanna hear about your ideas! :D

Re: Wild speculation!

[telesilla]

Hee! It's for a Sims 2 sheep. I'll drop you a note once I have screen caps to explain what I have in mind. *sighs* I wish I had had the patience to learn how to use Photoshop when I still had it.

Re: Wild speculation!

[phoenixsong]

If someone makes a Sims 3 sheep, hkellick will die of squee. Just sayin'. *eg*

Re: Wild speculation!

[telesilla]

I was thinking of a sheep with a plumbbob over its head so really it could be for any edition of the game! :)

Re: Wild speculation!

[hkellick]

Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease :D

Re: Wild speculation!

[naraht]

I think I might have to do some kind of sheep-creating contest. :D

You're going to have to get sheepdogs to help with the herding!

Re: Wild speculation!

[helens78]

...and LED lights. :D :D :D

Re: Open Beta speculations!

[piranha]

seed accounts will sell out in a matter of minutes. then the people who missed out will set their alarms so they can get ready for the second batch.

drama? OMG. open beta will have many more people who have no concept of what "beta" means. and the elitism wank is gonna continue, and the "i can't get MY name" shit is gonna start, and the people who're tired of the squee will get more nasty about it. and all sorts of old LJ business is gonna get dragged up because rah ran abuse. and there will be trolls. and shit stirrers who thrive on drama. oh yeah, lots of wank.

some people i know are eager to get in, some people i know are curious and willing to try it -- these are the ones i'll buy 1-month accounts for. some are ornery and pissed off at the hype, but so far nobody has harshed my squee too much. well, nobody i didn't expect to -- some people seem to rarely be happy for others. these are the people around whom you walk on eggshells if you're happy in love and they're unhappily single.

a lot more people than i expected actually got openIDs validated, and either already got an invite or will get one tomorrow. i am surprised because my flist is largely not in fandom, and also older and finds it harder to move into a new place. both my partners also made accounts, which surprised me, and i am pulling one of them into minionland. i guess my enthusiasm is still infectious. :)

generally i think there will be a lot of 1-month paid accounts because people without connections to those with invite codes (i see a lot of those on twitter) will want to try it out, and are not gonna bitch about $3.

i am most worried about people not grokking what "beta" means.

[melannen]

The first batch of seed accounts will sell out in about five minutes. The second batch will either go faster or longer, depending on how many people tried to get one in the first batch and didn't. (I'm betting on faster.)

There will be a bunch of namesquat grabs with invite codes and $3 accounts, but I bet that a lot of the people buying longer paid accounts and seed accounts will be people who were already here in beta. There will be a ton of new communities that never actually get any activity. I think the actual increase in activity, as opposed to just a rush on journal names (and minus a flurry of intro posts on the first few days) will pick up a lot more slowly over the first month or so, though.

Also, wank. And porn.

[foxfirefey]

Half an hour, woo!

[denise]

The servers are going to actually hold up under the onslaught!

[charmian]

Heh, my predictions: Seed accounts will sell out fairly quickly. There will also be a fair amount of people buying paid accounts, especially once they figure out that unless you pay, there are only three available styles.

There may be some new folk getting irritable about the beta-ness of some of the new features.