As most of you already know, Journals will be officially closing its doors on Nov 1st, 2008. This has been a tough month for me, as I am as much a part of JLand as you (having been part of the product's development team since its inception).
The good news here is that AOL is working on a migration plan and most likely destination is Blogger. So, you will soon receive another email (I think scheduled to go out Oct 7th) describing the migration process.
Although, it is incredibly
sad that JLand as we know it, is going away, I think this is the best thing to
happen for JLanders. In fact, the advantages of moving to Blogger are many..
- users can
permanently save their blogs as books or other files (something that a lot of you have been asking for).
- we can grow the
community over there.
-
users can monetize their blogs by putting ads in their blog
- you can get better themes and so on...
I am planning to migrate the Magic Smoke blog over, so that it can be the hub that we had here. So, in the coming
days and weeks I look to your support and ideas to make sure we keep the
community together after the migration.
sad that JLand as we know it, is going away, I think this is the best thing to
happen for JLanders. In fact, the advantages of moving to Blogger are many..
- users can
permanently save their blogs as books or other files (something that a lot of you have been asking for).
- we can grow the
community over there.
-
users can monetize their blogs by putting ads in their blog
- you can get better themes and so on...
I am planning to migrate the Magic Smoke blog over, so that it can be the hub that we had here. So, in the coming
days and weeks I look to your support and ideas to make sure we keep the
community together after the migration.
And finally, I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for some great memories. I have made lot of friends and you guys deserve all the credit for making JLand the finest example of community on the web.
Thanks and
Peace,
Vish
p.s Folks are wondering if their entire journal will be migrated and the answer is yes. ALL entries, comments, pictures, polls, videos will be migrated.
p.s Folks are wondering if their entire journal will be migrated and the answer is yes. ALL entries, comments, pictures, polls, videos will be migrated.
34 comments:
Wow. And to think I've seen no official word at all. I can't always read Magic Smoke, so glad I was online to receive the pop-up alert on this entry so that I am informed. I'm eager to hear if our current journals will go kaput, or migrate (and how to backup ours, as a just in case.......).
Thanks for letting us know. Shaking my head.......
I think we're all very saddened by this, Vish. Do we have a reason as to why AOL is doing this?
Beth
Vish, thanks for all of your support and efforts.
I am hoping blogger will add a place where you can set some sort of alert so you can get an alert when a blog is posted. If it has one I haven't seen it yet. Helen
h
Thanks Vish! Looking foward to learning how we can migrate. (Do we do it like the geese? LOL)
~Rosemary
its never goodbye but until we meet again!
Forgive my lack of computer savvy, but how would one "migrate a blog", would it be basically piece by piece, or some process of mass upload?
~S~
Thanks for all your efforts to keep this going Vish. This is a sad day, the Journals team was a fun team to work on and it is where I realized I am a blogger at heart!
Leona
Sunnybethe,
I am not pumping Blogger because I was asked to do it. I genuinely feel it is better to go to a place where their main business aligns with what you want to do.
As for communication, I think all of you will be receiving email by the end of the day.
Vish
h
AOL had the best thing going when they started the journals. Many of us never would have thought about starting one had it not been so easy. I must say I do wish they would reconsider their decision. I can not imagine what old timers like Dad at Dad's Tomato Garden will do without their journals. He's 95 and enjoying blogging so much. What ever were they thinking??? Gosh they had loads of free advertising on our journal pages. I do have a blogger page and will use it, but I will sadly miss my AOL journal. 'On Ya' - ma (from 'Good Morning Sunshine')
I know the rumors are true as you are telling us here...but what you and AOL have forgotten to tell us is the WHY???
Corporations such as AOL hold meetings when they decide these types of things. In those meetings department heads talk about REASONS for doing away with things or adding things...what is AOL and it's decision makers hiding from us? Are they ashamed to admit that making AOL Journals FREE for AIM users as well, a mistake?
did they loose so much money that they actually CAN'T support this service any longer?
WHY WHY WHY WHY???
I think us LOYAL bloggers of 5 years deserve to know!
When you say we'll be getting an email, is that everyone with an aol screenname, or just known AOL journalers or what?
I would like to know how to migrate my old, saved AOL journals even though I have not been active in the AOL journal community for some time.
Thanks.
Any idea what will happen with international blogs/journals users? Will we be advised as to blog migration and back-up plans, or will we just wake up one morning to find everything gonzo?
-Paul
http://journals.aol.ca/plittle/AuroraWalkingVacation/
I have just read through some of the tech articles available on the net about this situation, and I am unclear on exactly what is happening. The way I read the articles, AOL is shutting down its professional blogs - the ones it pays writers to write on. They are also shutting down AOL Hometown (no surprise there), AOL Pictures, and several other consumer media storage products. I cannot find it said anywhere that all AOL Journals are going to be shut down.
Can I get a clarification from an AOL employee on this?
-Paul
GRRRRR
Joyce
MyExtremelySimpleLife
I CAN NOT SAY HOW SAD I AM...THIS HAS HURT ME SO MUCH. I STARTED MY JOURNAL YEARS BEFORE MY HUSABND DIED . I FOUND A TRUE FAMILY HERE ...BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE THAT I WOULD HAVE NOT EVER KNOWN HAD IT NOT BEEN FOR AOL JOURNALS. THIS J-LAND FAMILY HELPED ME THROUGH THE WORST DAYS OF MY LIFE...AND CONTINUE TO DO SO....PLEASE , PLEASE MAKE SURE THAT THERE IS A WAY FOR US TO STAY TOGETHER AND KEEP OUR ENTIRE AOL JOURNAL ENTRIES INTACT...THEY INCLUDE SOME OF THE BEST YEARS OF MY LIFE.
SINCERELY,
CARLENE NOGGLE
OK, the http://www.peopleconnectionblog.com/ seems to have what amounts to an official announcement. Stay tuned to them for information on how to back up your blogs, and how the alleged migration plan will work. They say they will have a way of automatically transferring our journals to another platform, but I wouldn't rely on that. Everyone should back up their journals to their home computers immediately. There are instructions on how to do that at the people connection blog.
-Paul
It's funny how we get the announcement by the heading of our journals and on the lower right side of People Connection. I never read down there. I happened to find out from another journal. I think AOL should have notified all of it's members BEFORE placing the announcements at the top of our journals and on P.C. I've been with AOL for 12 years. Since they put the ads on our journals, I never pay attention to the top. How can AOL saying they are losing money with all the ads everywhere? I'm seriously thinking of changing my email client. I am tired of AOL screwing us over.
Vish...thank you for all your help this past year.
I have had NO e mail saying that our J land is going, is this some sort of joke or what?
Gaz
I received no email from AOL. what gives?
Dan
h
Thank you Vish, for this entry & being a part of jland. I like Blogger, I have had a blog there since the ads started to appear on AOL. The only problem is the alerts system, but I guess we will adjust.
Blogger has some nice features & has improved the past year.
Marie
Vish, keep us posted.....I will reactive my account at Blogger. So sad....but we will make the best of this move :).
Betty
thanks Vish!! it was a pleasure to work with you; I decided not to move and to give up journaling; its been a fun ride, but time to pursue other interests
best of luck :)
betty and koda
I never got the first email.... highly doubt i'll get the second one....(Oct 7th)....but if I do...I hope the migration process is an easy one for all of us....it's stressful enough to think we could lose years of our memories and the time we spent making our journals what they are today, let alone lose contact with all of our wonderful friends from Jland....
:::Sigh:::
Terri
Anyone know NOW of the procedure to transfer over your journal? I don't want to have to wait any longer than need be... I have 4 years to back up!
Thanks for the heads up and help, Vish.
~Jennifer
To Hell with AOL! This is lovely that, no offense to Vish,Krissy or Val, dropped this on us with about roughly a MONTH to move all the stuff that we have worked so hard on. You know what? I'm going to be saving my journal and moving on my own. No one's going to kick me out of my journal. I'll move on my own before they have a chance to do something so lame! First, they cover our journals with crappy ads we never asked for and now they shut down on us! I hope I'm not the only one feeling this way but I have so friggen had it with AOSmell! They tell us it's our journals,our thoughts, and then they friggen put ads we never asked for on the top of them,to bastardize them, and NOW they friggen shut us down! Thanks,AOL! Thanks for nothing but annoyances,pissing off a collective group of customers and then shutting us down. I couldn't appreciate you more if you dropped a friggen box on my toe or peed on my foot and told me it was raining!
wah!!!!!!!!!!! I don't wanna go! rose
I tried Blogger, and I absolutely HATED it. The themes were stupid and the fonts were for teenager's eyes, certainly not for anybody my age - OVER 50. The names for the blogs were difficult (they want you to use your real name), and you don't know where the people are from if they ever comment. There is no real meeting place, just a bunch of titles flashing by - who wants that? Think I'll go and either use one from MSN ( I have a HOTMAIL account), which I tried before and never worked properly, or use MYSPACE, and join the teenagers with all of their fancy sparkly things and such and pretend that I'm 13. (much like those lurkers that used to proliferate in the chat rooms) As for my email - not on your life will I ever give it out to anyone in cyberspace. I don't need more SPAM.
Sincerely, Rose~*
Of course you forgot to list the best and most obvious reason of all to be at Blogspot, where so many of us have been for a long time now - NO ADS on your journals!
Virginia
I left AOL blogs for Blogger a long time ago: when AOL first put the banner ads on the journals. But a lot of people stayed with AOL journals because they didn't want to lose the community. Now the AOL journals are being done away with all together? It's just sad. Sad as in cynical of AOL to delete these services because they bring no "money." (Then why did AOL put ads on our journals in the first place?) Can't AOL see that people subscribe to AOL because of the community aspect that they had created? It just makes me sick.
Post a Comment