Hi folks -- quick update right now -- I will post a followup entry with more details as soon as I finish writing it.
The Journals 2.0 Release 2 (or R2) is live now. I had originally meant to pre-message you to give you a heads-up, but I screwed up on the date: It went live around 5AM today, the 15th -- I thought it was going to be the 16th, so instead of being able to give you a warning, I have to tell you what you already know. I apologize for my mistake.
Again, I will go into a lot more detail in my followup post -- here is the topline on the changes:
* Spellcheck on Journal Entries
* 728x90 Ad Banner added on top of all Journals: (AIM, AOL, public, private, editor and member)
* Bug Fixes: Included is an reduction of the displayed Comment Alert length -- we think this was a cause of some of the Comment Alert non-delivery problems. Also, the problem of text not showing up in archived entries on blogs with black backgrounds has been fixed.
Open issues related to the installation include:
* Posting via IM (to the AOLJournals bot) may not be working
* Display of your Journals on the Journals main page module may be having intermittent problems
* Other problems including inability to save entries in certain browsers.
Like I said, I will post a followup entry with more information. I apologize for the (or my) confusion.
Thanks -- Joe
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74 comments:
the ad banner is unacceptable. judi
The ad banner is not acceptable, especially for we paid members. Also, are these the "upgrades" you mentioned in your recent email to me? If so, they are a HUGE disappointment.
Looks like I'm going to be changing journal services.
The ads on the journals cheapens them. I don't pay aol to have my personal space invaded with ads. It would be nice if aol would start listening more to the customers. I know it's not your fault.
The ads are wrong. Just plain wrong!
Joe,
Please let the powers to be know that the Ad banners are completely unacceptable. I feel I am already paying an inflated price for my AOL service, but I do pay it because I love the J-Land Community. Nobody is likeing the Ad Banners and if other journalers leave I will too.
Shadie
Screw it. I will not pay to have an ad banner on MY journal.
~~ jennifer
I do not like the ad banners as they are distracting. I don't really think AOl or the advertising companies will benefit from these ads. It's like getting spam mail in our emails. Helen
h
The ad banner is not acceptable, unless, of course, AOL Is going to pay me for use of my space, but then again, I could pass on the money because being blinded by a flashing Quizno's ad this morning rather pissed me off.
I PAY for AOL, therefore should not be submitted to advertise on my personal journal pages. Period.
Until I am fixed, and am no longer blinded, my pages can be found at
http://intheshadowoftheiris.blogspot.com/
The higher powers snuck into MY extremely personal journal last night and like thiefs leaving their mark, sprayed graffiti in the form of adverstising on MY personal walls.
Disguested is a minor representation to how I feel right now.
Rebecca
Let AOL go down in history for making THE stupidest marketing move ever. Way to go.
Ari
h
No advertisements!!
NO! NO! NO!
It is the only way to tell AIM from AOL currently, and we have to pay for our service!
If they put ad banners on our journals, we should get our accounts for free! AOL/Time Warner won't go for that.... so they can save their ads for the people who do not pay monthly fees....
Cat
Add banners on any PAID AOL journal are still unacceptable. Period.
HUGE mistake.
I also cannot add an entry to my public journal today, but can in my private journal. Go figure. Hmmm.
I hate ad banners with a flaming passion. My journal now looks like crap. Please make it go away! Why the hell am I paying for AOL when I can just get a free AIM journal? I don't want ads on my personal web pages!
So we know longer have to pay for our Journals?
Many of us subscribe to AOL solely for the Journal community. Are we now all AIM members now?
Rediculous!
http://journals.aol.com/deabvt/DeablerVT/
V
h
Please do something about the ads. I agree with previous rants, it's just not fair when we pay for the service!
~Danielle
h
No "Add Entry" button? Like, did no one TEST the flippin' code before integrating it? AOL should be embarassed.
I am also angry about the ads. This WAS NOT MY AGREEMENT WITH AOL when I started the journal. I understood that it was MY place. A personal place. AOL might "own" the content, but they could not alter or add to the content. And yet AOL has co-opted a piece of it and implies my endorsement. Has AOL considered the legal ramifications of that? Are they going to GIVE ME A CUT OF THE PROFITS on those ads?
~~Silk
I will be looking for another service. AOL is treating us with contempt to put offensive banner ads up. Unbelievable and the worst thing I have seen AOL do since my membership started in 1993!!!!!
Virginia
How much did Bank Of America pay AOL to whore out their most loyal customers?
Bank Of America tries to charge you $20 for a savings account, which is a big pile of Shull Bit. I resent advertising for them, especially when it was forced onto us.
You may take a whole lot less s*** if:
- we Journalers can choose from 5 or 10 sponsors, like Weatherbug
- AOL Journalers can be given a discount, seeing as AOL is using us to push a seedy bank on our formerly priceless readers.
- provide an email addy for someone at AOL who we can complain to, en masse.
- explain how both you and Scalzi managed to forget that this Major and Obviously Upsetting Journal development was going to happen? I taught high school, Joe... I can smell nonsense a mile away. You even have the same excuse.
I wasn't joking when i asked how much AOL made off this nonsense.
h
I really resent that our Journals are now advertising spaces for AOL. GET THEM OFF JOURNALS NOW pleaseandthankyou. I am not paying to be a nonconsenting billboard and neither am I purchasing anything from the advertisers I see located there. They are extremely intrusive and annoying. ~Sie http://journals.aol.com/sieblonde/Pfft
Hey Joe,
Why not join us in the AOL JOURNALS BOYCOTT until the advertising goes?!
http://journals.aol.com/armandt/sense/entries/813
Armand
now at http://armandt.blogspot.com
I'd also recommend to people who are upset... changing your Journal Description to "Bank Of America Sucks!"
Dude, bad move on AOL's part. This banner ad thing will be the death knell of journal land.
Oh - and as long as the advertising is going to remain on our Journals, could you add one more thing to the very top left of the banner?
Currently, there are links to:
AOL Main, Mail, AIM, and Join AOL.
Please add the link to CANCEL AOL.
Thanks, Joe! You're a great guy!
I'll look for that CANCEL button this afternoon!!
Armand
http://armandt.blogspot.com
formerly - http://journals.aol.com/armandt/sense
Dude, I agree with Mr. Butter. The ads suck.
Also, could we have our buttons back? Journals are kind of pointless if we can't add or edit entries.
Thanks in advance.
nice heads up joe.
tell whoever thought of this brilliant move out to take the offensive and obnoxious ads OFF IMMEDIATELY.
AND RETURN THE ADD/EDIT ENTRY BUTTONS.
can't really have a journal without them, now can we? sheeze.
take the ads down immediately or lose me as a customer.
Well after my 6th attempt to "save" todays journal i give up!.. i have no spell check button (don't really care).. am as upset as one can get right now.. i can't even add to the journal.. all i get to do is watch the horrid banner... thanks..
sorry, it's not your fault Joe.. when it allows me i will delete all the journal entries i've made and exit journal land.. i don't need more ads or this sort of frustration.
I thought I had a reason to stay with aol. Nice j-land and all. No reason to stay. I can have a blog anywhere!
Traci
NO WAY!! This is not going to fly! We, as aol members, already have enough to deal with! We already get gouged in aols pricing plans, but we deal with it because of the easy interface. We are not going to tolerate "BANNERS" being advertised on "our" journals. This is just total BS!! And WTH happened to our "Add entry" buttons ??? If aol wants to advertise then they need to cut their pricing plans in half and be compromisable! Otherwise....I'll be going to another provider!
Sincerely,
A VERY UPSET MEMBER,
Angel
h
I have just my photoblog left on AOL, to take advantage of the ftp space. I'll be looking to host it elsewhere. There are plenty of free blogging services without ads. Blogger, for one, unless you opt in to AdSense, or even LiveJournal. I have blogs with both those services and I'll be photoblogging most likely with one of them, unless I find something else I like better that is ad-free.
I understand AOL's desire to improve its bottom line. Ad banners on AIM blogs is fine. But I'm already paying for AOL and I will not have blogs with ads on them, not when I have other options that cost me nothing. Little by little, everything that has made AOL worth having over the last 10 years is going away. It's discouraging.
Advertising on journals. Worst move since generic TV's.
Joe, by now I hope you realize what an absolute disastrous idea the banner ads are. Complete and total BS. We PAY for this service. It's bad enough AOL makes us read flashing ads on our welcome screen and Mailbox windows.
I can see why you didn't inform us earlier. Didn't give us any say or any chance to boycott. And where are our "skins" for the top of our journals? Tell me the banner ads are NOT what you were referring to!
FIGHT FOR US. REMOVE THE BANNER ADS IMMEDIATELY.
If something isn't done to take care of PAYING CUSTOMERS, the world will read about it on our new non-AOl-blogs.
Thanks for the update Joe.
I'm not real happy with the banner advertisments. Ya'll can do better than that approach. It's lazy marketing. I'm not going to take it out on you though. Unsure where to direct my complaint about the advertising.
I am glad the background issue is fixed. I had to use Firefox to make my entry as I could not log in through IE inside the AOL client to make my update.
Freee -- I have a feeling the only people who are going to fight FOR us is us. Sad, isn't it.
~~ jennifer
Get the ads off our journals, Joe. We won't tolerate this. We won't shut up about it and we won't go away. Get them off. NOW.
Ari
I want that banner ad gone, or I'm gone. I see I'm not alone, either. This is already the most expensive blog hosting service. don't tell me "Oops, I screwed up on the date."
I absolutely hate the advertisements on a service I"m paying for....
~ www.jerseygirljournal.com
What a sell out, trying to act like the ad is no big deal coupling it with other options!
I am no whore to corporations. I WANT IT OFF!!!! I DO NOT PAY TO BE A WHORE!!! I COULD DO IT FOR FREE OR CHARGE TO DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Joe...how much does AOL pay you? Is it enough to stand idly by while they "rape" our PAID journals with advertising? Is it not enough that the companies pay to advertise with AOL, but now they have to use PAYING customers personal space to whore out these same businesses. WTH???!!!!??? I not only feel violated by this HUGELY GROTESQUE BANNER, but I feel like my money to AOL isn't really worth all that much to them. AOL has been going downhill for quite sometime....but this time they overdid it. This is just wrong!!!!
Dear Joe,
This has got to be the most boneheaded move AOL has ever made... No other blogging/weblog/web journal service puts banner ads on the pages of paying customers...! If I am not paying for a service, I understand that the conditions of using it for free means banner ads - the company must make revenue somehow... But if I am *paying*, I do *not* expect to be used as an unwilling billboard for the masses... I, like many others, will now be cancelling my AOL service... I shall give my money to Bravenet, whom I *know* will be happy to remove the advertisements and treats me a damned sight better than AOL is doing...
This was not only a stupid move, but an incredibly rude and insensitive one... AOL journals have some of the least features of any blog service, and The Powers That Be *actually* thought they could make the service even *less* and still keep customers...? Obviously the needs and desires of their customers does not concern AOL when it comes down to the bottom line... I shall be joining the boycott movement and making preparations to move all of my journal entries elsewhere...
I just discovered that it's a TOS violation if we advertise on our own journals...ironic no?
Joe,
This is bull*hit. You knew this was coming and John says so in his journal I have had many J-Landers contact me with new blogs they are starting all over the web. Please see the email I just sent out:
I spoke with AOL Billing and Cancellation Department this morning. They assured me I was the first phone call they had, had concerning canceling over my journal having banner ad. Please call these two numbers to complain to complain call 1-888-418-1447 (To inform them if this does not stop you will cancel) and 1-800-827-3338 (Tech support and also tell them will be canceling if they are not removed).
You can also see the message thread concerning this at:
http://messageboards.aol.com/aol/en_us/articles.php?boardId=534372&articleId=51552&func=6&channel=Computers+%26+Electronics&filterRead=false&filterHidden=true&filterUnhidden=false
Gabreael
Oh is it...? Now that *is* ironic... They can make money off our work, but we can't...
Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed
Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed
Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed
Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed Corporate Greed
Our company calls this putting out fires......
a bad day in journal land.....
WOW Joe that's pretty weasle like behavior there dontcha think? I forgot the date but look what you get with your shiny new ad banner, a spellcheck. Well pardom me but I don't give a pluck about spellcheckers ARE YOU HEARING ME???? I pay for this crappy service and you get paid again by the advertiser so you are charging for the same space twice, sounds shady and unethical to me..... I can smell a class action lawsuit arising can you? AOHELL IS MY PIMP or AOHELL IS MY SLUMLORD will be my new journal name because somehow the whole My world, My rant thing just doesn't feel much like my world, feels like I have the loan officer from Bank of America's head up my arse and the virtual pipes of it isn't working as I can't access it, etc...so I'm gonna go with AOHELL IS MY SLUMLORD. Jesus didn't yall just lay off a ton of people because your paying customer base was sooooo low, did they think this would "improve" it, lmfao. Who is running AOHELL, Microsoft???? LMFAO. I mean if I must have ads on my journal should I be able to pick and chose them?? This bites Joe and you know it, it's corporate greed at it's best and I'll be no part of it so you mister tries to be slick and just weasle that little crappy mention of the ad banner in there while trying to entice with shiny new toys, well guess what me and my readers don't give a pluck if I can spell or not so keep your spellchecker and black background b.s. I don't need none and don't want none. Get the SQUATTER BOA out of my effin journal immediately because as of right now YOU HAVE ONE MONTH WITH ME TO CORRECT YOURSELVES ON THIS. I wouldn't just show up on your doorstep unannounced with my moving van and move myself right on into your master suite without asking first and I don't recall anyone asking me if I would mind sleeping with Bank of America.
Joe: Add my name to those who are going to move their blogs elsewhere if AOL does not remove the banners from the top of my journal. It's bad enough that I rip my heart out here, but to have AOL make money from my misery is more than I can stand.
Back when Steve ran the show, and back when they were paying my salary, we actually gave a damn about the customers.
h
Ummm... Joe? I've got a few issues with my journal and you're not a very popular guy. Joe? Don't run away from me, JOE!
Judith
http://journals.aol.com/jtuwliens/MirrorMirrorontheWall
h
oh yea, add my name to the list. Blogspot, MyFamily, I hear they are really hyping their blog space!! or Myspace, you name it, I'm headed there.
If I have to look at ads, I'm not gonna PAY for a service on top of that.
Ads, I expect free.
Pay, I expect no ads.
Its that simple.
I have been with AOL for almost 10 years. Since inception. WOW. What a way to go.
~ Karyn
http://journals.aol.com/karynetaylor/WhateverItTakes/
I hate this it stinks take the banners off!!!!!!!!!!!!! let them kno w we the people are mad and many are leaving.
Wow--I'm glad I cancelled my AOL account when I did. The only thing that was keeping me with AOHell was the journal, then I found out that AIM had them for free--with the banner. Now paying customers have the ad too?? That's just not right...I completely agree with all of the previous comments. Greedy--that's all I have to say. That and I can see a lot of paying customers were with one foot out the AOL door...now I see them leaving.
Annie =)
journals.aol.com/krspkrmmom/nooneshome
We pay for this... what's with the AD?!
-Andrew - Picture: Weather
Joe, I just have to add my voice to this. I understand banner ads when I am using a FREE service, but I PAY for my AOL (in fact, I pay in ADDITION to the amount I already pay for my cable access!) The reason I have stuck it out is for journals. I like the community here, and I was willing to put up with some things, but unless you are paying my, I WANT THOSE ADS GONE! Now, IF you plan to pay me, or cut the amount I pay for my service, MAYBE (and that's a BIG Maybe) we can talk. I'm off now to check out other blogging services!
http://journals.aol.com/astaryth/AdventuresofanEclecticMind
Small wonder AOL is losing two million customers a year. I think they're getting desparate to make up for the lost revenue. This Journal ad business is by no means the only example of bad managment--only the most recent. It will be interesting to see if the JLander's well-founded outrage leads to any change. In general, the AOL attitude seems to be that if they ignore complaints long enough, they will just disappear. We'll see.
We PAY for our AOL. Let the free AIM accounts have the ads. Get them off of PAYING CUSTOMERS WHO ARE PAYING FOR NOTHING THAT AOL ISN'T GIVING AWAY FOR FREE.
I know it's not your decision, but you're the "face" we see. This is the last straw.
Imagine that tomorrow morning, your call your significant other on her mobile phone, which you pay for. When you dial the number, the phone rings twice, you hear it pick up but instead of hearing her say “Hi honey!†you hear:
"Bank of America has 18,000 ATMs one of them is near you. Stop by your local Bank of America today and get free checking for one year.
Are your pictures printed on Kodak paper? Ask for it at Walgreens."
Then the phone rings once more and your significant other picks up.
Would you stand for that? No? So why should we pay for the same thing from AOL. This was a horrible, horrible, move on AOL’s part.
Chris
http://inanethoughtsandinsaneramblings.blogspot.com/
http://www.bigoven.com/~swibirun
Adding these banner ads to our journals is wrong. I will not post another entry in my journal, THERESA WILLIAMS-AUTHOR until these ADs are removed. Can you not imagine what it feels like to post heartfelt, sensitive, and/or intellectual material and to see an ad for mortgages or skin cream blinking above it? Don't you "get it"? It's more than absurd. You are going to lose a lot of excellent journalers over this.
Advertising controversy aside, I am unable to even add an entry to my journal. What is the possible plus of this to anyone?
Patrick http://journals.aol.com/daddyleer/CaregivinglyYours/
Stupidest marketing move AOL has ever made. I read all the comments and not one of them have a compliment about these stupid ADS.
AOL is already losing like 500 billion members a day, and this will surely help bring them back.
I'm leaving.
Transferring.
To BlogSpot or LiveJournal. They're way better than this [bleep] wasteland region of J-Land.
Here is the same comment I posted to Scalzi's journal:
Chalk one more in the column of "hate the ad banners." This is just AOL reminding us, as they feel compelled to do from time to time, that our journals are NOT ours, that they can and will do anything they want with them, and we have absolutely no recourse, except to leave AOL. And so, many of us shall.
I have been an AOL customer since 1997. My husband has been bugging me for years to change ISP's, mostly because AOL is the most expensive service out there. But I have insisted we not drop AOL...$300 a year for the privelege of belonging to and writing for the journal community has been worth it for me. The addition of these hideous and unwanted ad banners has greatly devalued the service. In fact, I don't see why I should pay that kind of money to help line the pockets of AOL advertisers. Wouldn't it be more traditional for THEM to pay US?
Not to mention the fact that this little "upgrade" had completely screwed up the technical aspect of journal land. Maybe we would not be QUITE as angry about the ads if we were not locked out of our journals, unable to post, unable to comment, unable to properly copy and paste out of our word processing programs. Let's face it, AOL. You monumentally screwed up on this one. Lisa :-[ http://journals.aol.com/mlraminiak/ComingtotermswithMiddleAge/
I didn't know that AIM journalers fot their journals for free. WHY the hell am I paying $23.95 a month? I know...AOL WANTS me to go somewhere else!
Hey Joe,
Hows it feel to be the most hated guy on AOL?
So much for the AOL commercials that they listen to their customers. I hope Julia Roberts knows she is not lying!
Joe, I posted my feelings on this with John, but I want to let you know that I am more than angry about suddenly being forced to advertise for a variety of businesses that I don't choose to endorse. As soon as I am able to save an entry to my journal, I will post my new blog site, and will not post another public entry unless the ads are removed. Most sincerely, Lisa
So first you strip away everything decent about the message boards (losing customers) and then, as if that didn't cut deeply enough into your *ha!* beloved customers, you rape J-Land as well? And I can't even post this rant on my OWN journal because, as you *ha! cough-cough* "made improvements to" J-Land, you BROKE the damn thing so now my SEND button doesn't work!
Get this: I don't HAVE to pay for AOL. I already have cable modem and I CHOSE to pay over and above that price for AOL because I liked the community here (message boards and journals). You took that away from me and now I can get everything I want for free elsewhere. Don't ever tell any of us again that you value your customers.
It'll be a pain to change my e-mail address and notify everyone, but at this point, why the hell not?
from http://journals.aol.com/johnmscalzi/bytheway/entries/4057
"For AOL Journalers, this means that the neighborhood is about to get a lot bigger and a lot more diverse -- and, not entirely coincidentally, that all your friends with AIM accounts will now be able to have their own blog here on AOL, with all the features of AOL Journals (the real difference is that AIM Blogs, being a free service, have an ad at the top, whereas AOL Journals, as part of your paid AOL account, are ad-free)."
My mama would call that a lie.
Virginia
now at: http://animalnaturespirits.blogspot.com/
Why should I continue with AOL? What gives AOL the right to up their revenues on my personal blog??? I PAY FOR MY AOL SERVICE!!!! What exactly am I paying for now?
Tonight's dinner conversation will be about finding a new ISP. This stinks. I feel like someone has spray-painted ads all over my beloved home and forced out all of my loved neighbors!!
Steph
Although the spell feature is a good idea the new banner is not. I thought AOL would know by now that having banners is a personal thing. A choice is what people want. Offer us a discount if we use it...otherwise leave it off. Seems like an unnecessary restriction. You can tell from the URL that this is an AOL address. Someone at AOL blew it on the Customer Marketing here...now I think damage control is in order....
Ummm. I really don't want to join in to all the goofy drama stuff, but the banner thing is kind of silly. At least let us choose the banner to represent us, or whatever. I'm actually here because I am coming through a different server in the last month or so, but i kept my aol, at normal cost, because i enjoyed certain features, the main being journals. I haven't been able to post for three days now except through i.m.'s and now i'm going to have to carry a banner too? What do I pay a monthly premium for? -jessica http://journals.aol.com/misstyfyd/Evolving
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