Dreamwidth survey going around.
1. Why did you sign up for Dreamwidth?
Okay, so ... to be completely honest I don't remember. I know I was having a lot of accessibility issues with LJ, whose layout changes were starting to cause problems. Somehow I ended up on #dw, and then a few "omg do it"s and a purple sitescheme later, I had an account during closed beta.
2. Why did you choose your journal name?
I've been pseudelight in internet circles for approximately forever, and I wanted to be even more, IDK, iconic or just short. Nowadays I use a different username for many things, anything I'm going to give access to people I may meet from work or school just because there's a lot of things attached to pseudelight that people just won't get. Mostly it's silly original fiction or memberships to odd websites, but I'm just a little paranoid about that kind of thing.
3. Do you crosspost? Why or why not?
I don't, because (as the unpleasant followup to the situation with #1) I can't actually look at LJ anymore; their layout actually gives me some kind of seizure reaction. I think my last crosspost was sometime in 2010. I believe I have maybe one or two friends who still use LJ, but I keep up with them on Twitter.
4. What do you do online when you're not on DW?
I'm very active on Twitter! I have a personal and a professional account; if you want them please poke me somehow, happy to put up links. I log into an AJAX chat for Emperor's Edge fandom sometimes, but since being in a job that gets me home at 11pm I tend to miss my chat peeps a lot. And yes, I still roleplay quite a lot. I'm not actually in any DW-based games, though, which feels weird, but I think none of them have the sort of activity policy and style I can keep up with. Used to do tumblr, but it got too overwhelming; I've been working on setting up a second account but never get around to finishing it.
5. How about when you're not on the computer?
Okay first ... all of those things up there are far from everything I do on the computer, the question said online. There's definitely stuff I do on the computer that isn't online! Er. Anyway. To actually answer the question: I have a full-time job, and am also a full-time student, and I'm spending a lot of time sitting at my dad's bedside at hospice chilling (and doing whatever schoolwork I can from right here).
6. What do you wish people who read your journal knew about you?
Honestly, I have no idea. I wish people wanted to know things and then asked, I guess? Becasue I guess I want people to know whatever they want to know. I'm a shy and awkward open book; there are very few things I won't talk about, but I'm very bad at bringing things up due to my upbringing. "Keep yourself to yourself," the family adage. Which sounds really shitty, but it's actually a matter of "don't talk about yourself a lot, don't make things revolve around you" as opposed to "don't say anything if you need help," my family is actually very good about making sure everyone feels as if when they are in need they can say so and get whatever help everyone else may be able to supply.
7. What is your favorite community on Dreamwidth?
"Sadly, the community scene on DW is one that never took off," quoth![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
forests_of_fire, and this is so true. :( Of the activeish ones, I enjoy ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
agonyaunt and fucking_meds. Plus dailyprompt, even if I never did get around to making a writing journal for my current ridiculous world-project.
8. What community do you wish was more active?
Each and every one, because seriously, I'm in more active communities on Facebook and I don't even like Facebook. But some concepts I wish took off:doesanyoneelse, factfinding (it took off for a while but has slowed down), overheard, product_junkies.
9. Are there two people on your reading list that you think should meet?
I feel like basically my entire reading list already overlaps at this point, or at least comes close.
10. Tell me about your default icon.
I have a big thing for old keys/skeleton keys/keys in general. This is a key picture that speaks to me.
11. What features do you think Dreamwidth should have that it doesn't currently?
Drafts, scheduled posts, better image hosting interface and ... in general, since every image I've tried to post through DW has turned into a disaster somehow or another.
12. What do you consider the five most "telling" interests from the list on your profile?
♥, being girly, character development, mysteries, public health.
13. Do you have any unique interests on your user profile? What are they? How'd they get there?
Oh, gosh, I will admit I just do not have the energy to explain them all, but I'm perfectly happy to explain one (or as many as you like) if someone's directly interested in it. I think some are obvious, some are a bit weirder.
14. Did you have a gateway fandom? Still in it? Why or why not? Is there a community for it on DW?
Dragonriders of Pern, solely through RP (I was a Pern roleplayer somewhere between four and six years before I read the books, and I still have a preference for fanon over canon Pern). I am still in it as far as RP is concerned, though I took a four-year hiatus and then another year hiatus several years after that. If there's a community for the canonical Pern, I honestly don't know, because I never looked. Due to my Pern fandom all being original characters and slightly alternate to canon by the author's insistence, I care very little about stories about canon, and other fandoms not being OC-centric confused me for ages.
15. What's your current obsession? What about it captures your imagination?
The Fallen Empire series, in terms of fannish things, because it is, I don't know, but it's wonderful. My own sci-fi universe is also a giant brain-eater I do basically nothing with, because I do not like existing in a vacuum and that's why my creative content tends to all be around RP; I have this huge issue writing things that other people have no reason to care about.
16. What are you glad you did but haven't really had a chance to post about?
Everything? It's basically everything I'm glad I've done.
17. How many people on your reading list do you know IRL?
There are some people who do not post anymore, but no one who actively uses DW. There are a couple of people who live in the same area as me but we've never actually met.
18. What don't you talk about here, either because it's too personal or because you don't have the energy?
Likely almost everything, because I tend to just ... not have the energy. I'm impressed by those of you who, when you had a dying parent, wrote a lot about how you felt and vented your spleens openly (or, well, behind a lock); I wish I could do that, to some extent. Even if I would never want to look back on it. But I just don't have enough energy to write anything.
19. Any questions from the audience?
If there are, please feel free to ask them. Questions make the world go 'round, even if it takes me 40 years to answer comments.
20. Yes, but what are your thoughts on yaoi?
I don't really have any, disappointingly to many.
21. What's your favorite thing about Dreamwidth?
Right now it's "its social community is expansive and interesting but not Tumblr levels of toxic and trying too hard." It's amazing how I became afraid to write anything fictional at all for about a year because of the standards Tumblr seemed to try to be pushing; it became impossible to do anything without it being wrong. I got over it.
Okay, so ... to be completely honest I don't remember. I know I was having a lot of accessibility issues with LJ, whose layout changes were starting to cause problems. Somehow I ended up on #dw, and then a few "omg do it"s and a purple sitescheme later, I had an account during closed beta.
2. Why did you choose your journal name?
I've been pseudelight in internet circles for approximately forever, and I wanted to be even more, IDK, iconic or just short. Nowadays I use a different username for many things, anything I'm going to give access to people I may meet from work or school just because there's a lot of things attached to pseudelight that people just won't get. Mostly it's silly original fiction or memberships to odd websites, but I'm just a little paranoid about that kind of thing.
3. Do you crosspost? Why or why not?
I don't, because (as the unpleasant followup to the situation with #1) I can't actually look at LJ anymore; their layout actually gives me some kind of seizure reaction. I think my last crosspost was sometime in 2010. I believe I have maybe one or two friends who still use LJ, but I keep up with them on Twitter.
4. What do you do online when you're not on DW?
I'm very active on Twitter! I have a personal and a professional account; if you want them please poke me somehow, happy to put up links. I log into an AJAX chat for Emperor's Edge fandom sometimes, but since being in a job that gets me home at 11pm I tend to miss my chat peeps a lot. And yes, I still roleplay quite a lot. I'm not actually in any DW-based games, though, which feels weird, but I think none of them have the sort of activity policy and style I can keep up with. Used to do tumblr, but it got too overwhelming; I've been working on setting up a second account but never get around to finishing it.
5. How about when you're not on the computer?
Okay first ... all of those things up there are far from everything I do on the computer, the question said online. There's definitely stuff I do on the computer that isn't online! Er. Anyway. To actually answer the question: I have a full-time job, and am also a full-time student, and I'm spending a lot of time sitting at my dad's bedside at hospice chilling (and doing whatever schoolwork I can from right here).
6. What do you wish people who read your journal knew about you?
Honestly, I have no idea. I wish people wanted to know things and then asked, I guess? Becasue I guess I want people to know whatever they want to know. I'm a shy and awkward open book; there are very few things I won't talk about, but I'm very bad at bringing things up due to my upbringing. "Keep yourself to yourself," the family adage. Which sounds really shitty, but it's actually a matter of "don't talk about yourself a lot, don't make things revolve around you" as opposed to "don't say anything if you need help," my family is actually very good about making sure everyone feels as if when they are in need they can say so and get whatever help everyone else may be able to supply.
7. What is your favorite community on Dreamwidth?
"Sadly, the community scene on DW is one that never took off," quoth
forests_of_fire, and this is so true. :( Of the activeish ones, I enjoy agonyaunt and fucking_meds. Plus dailyprompt, even if I never did get around to making a writing journal for my current ridiculous world-project. 8. What community do you wish was more active?
Each and every one, because seriously, I'm in more active communities on Facebook and I don't even like Facebook. But some concepts I wish took off:
doesanyoneelse, factfinding (it took off for a while but has slowed down), overheard, product_junkies.9. Are there two people on your reading list that you think should meet?
I feel like basically my entire reading list already overlaps at this point, or at least comes close.
10. Tell me about your default icon.
I have a big thing for old keys/skeleton keys/keys in general. This is a key picture that speaks to me.
11. What features do you think Dreamwidth should have that it doesn't currently?
Drafts, scheduled posts, better image hosting interface and ... in general, since every image I've tried to post through DW has turned into a disaster somehow or another.
12. What do you consider the five most "telling" interests from the list on your profile?
♥, being girly, character development, mysteries, public health.
13. Do you have any unique interests on your user profile? What are they? How'd they get there?
Oh, gosh, I will admit I just do not have the energy to explain them all, but I'm perfectly happy to explain one (or as many as you like) if someone's directly interested in it. I think some are obvious, some are a bit weirder.
- althings
- amazingness
- cherry red lipstick
- invited to the sound
- naps (in captains' chairs)
- original things
- promises that are kept
- recreating mythology
- entient electric flowers
- simple definitions
- the spectrum
14. Did you have a gateway fandom? Still in it? Why or why not? Is there a community for it on DW?
Dragonriders of Pern, solely through RP (I was a Pern roleplayer somewhere between four and six years before I read the books, and I still have a preference for fanon over canon Pern). I am still in it as far as RP is concerned, though I took a four-year hiatus and then another year hiatus several years after that. If there's a community for the canonical Pern, I honestly don't know, because I never looked. Due to my Pern fandom all being original characters and slightly alternate to canon by the author's insistence, I care very little about stories about canon, and other fandoms not being OC-centric confused me for ages.
15. What's your current obsession? What about it captures your imagination?
The Fallen Empire series, in terms of fannish things, because it is, I don't know, but it's wonderful. My own sci-fi universe is also a giant brain-eater I do basically nothing with, because I do not like existing in a vacuum and that's why my creative content tends to all be around RP; I have this huge issue writing things that other people have no reason to care about.
16. What are you glad you did but haven't really had a chance to post about?
Everything? It's basically everything I'm glad I've done.
17. How many people on your reading list do you know IRL?
There are some people who do not post anymore, but no one who actively uses DW. There are a couple of people who live in the same area as me but we've never actually met.
18. What don't you talk about here, either because it's too personal or because you don't have the energy?
Likely almost everything, because I tend to just ... not have the energy. I'm impressed by those of you who, when you had a dying parent, wrote a lot about how you felt and vented your spleens openly (or, well, behind a lock); I wish I could do that, to some extent. Even if I would never want to look back on it. But I just don't have enough energy to write anything.
19. Any questions from the audience?
If there are, please feel free to ask them. Questions make the world go 'round, even if it takes me 40 years to answer comments.
20. Yes, but what are your thoughts on yaoi?
I don't really have any, disappointingly to many.
21. What's your favorite thing about Dreamwidth?
Right now it's "its social community is expansive and interesting but not Tumblr levels of toxic and trying too hard." It's amazing how I became afraid to write anything fictional at all for about a year because of the standards Tumblr seemed to try to be pushing; it became impossible to do anything without it being wrong. I got over it.
interests
Re: interests
And naps in captains' chairs was a thing from my old job! I was a 12-hour shift paramedic, and the only time I ever got any sleep was in the captain's chair in the back of the ambulance. I lived for those naps.
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If this makes you uncomfortable to answer, no worries! I've just always been curious because I knew you before and I've known you since, and it's like everything happened quietly off-camera.
:D?
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Met at least once, possibly twice in person before being a couple was a thing that even came up. And I'm asexual and resistant to emotional connections, so getting me into coupledom took a lot of work. :) Pursuing and visits and driving four hours to get my suicidal ass to eat. But hey, literally saving my life goes a long way! Been together for about a decade, lived together for eight and a half years after I was supposed to stay for a couple of months while homeless. It's been a VERY long couple of months, and we've moved together three times, we now both live with my mom …
No idea what else to say! Happy to answer anything, though it may be more suited to PM depending on the question. I really am an open book but I am The Worst at explaining things.
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Also, I have mixed feelings about MWays but it's a relief to know that other people came out of there with some issues with OOC things. I'm grateful for some of the people I met (those of you I'm still friends with today), but I don't really look back at my time in MWays as a positive experience because of some of the OOC stuff I witnessed/was subjected to.
Also, also, one day I might pick your brain on being asexual in a relationship, if you're willing to talk about it. It's a label I've only recently began understanding about myself and I'm still boggling about it in my head right now. ONE DAY, I'll be ready to write about it in my journal. I hope.:^/