They’ll do what they want, regardless.

I’m already (slowly) deleting all my goals, and no longer really posting.

Now I’ll probably start unsubscribing to people really quickly. Because there are many people I read because I find them inspiring on the basis of a particular goal, but I don’t have much else in common with them, and therefore rarely cheer or comment on them. So it feels stalker-ish of me to subscribe to them, and I’ll be embarrassed if they see me as a subscriber and think, “Who? Really? Why?”

Although since I don’t post much and rarely comment anymore (since Buttongate) I pretty much feel stalker-ish anyway. I just haven’t been able to stop myself from swinging by to check on people I once talked to frequently, and grew to care about.

Sigh.

for posting this Absnasm…._{I’ve aired my thoughts on this too!} :-)

seeing when “someone” unsubscribed – makes me (briefly) feel like I did something wrong.

Seeing who’s subscribed can make you feel obligated to reciprocate.

If they are going to make it freely open, I’d rather they moved so while it is accessible info, it’s not something you see everytime you go to look at new entries.

on their blog, but I’m commenting here too just to help spread the word; I suspect a lot of 43Ters don’t really keep up with the blog, and since we have the opportunity to give feedback before the change this time, the more people who avail of it the better.

I don’t feel the need to know who’s subscribed to me, but I know some people do. (And I have to admit that curiosity will probably make me take a peek if they make it possible, but I won’t be intending to pay much attention to it after that.) I can see the potential for hurt feelings and misunderstandings, but I do think that if they implement this change we will adjust to it – for example if someone’s unsubbing from people cos of time constraints or whatever, they can simply post to say so and that it’s not cos they’re bored. We’re a strong community and we’re (supposed to be) self-aware adults; I’d like to think there won’t be the same kind of pettiness that there would be somewhere like FB in similar circumstances.

What did make me rather cross was what Josh said in the paragraph headed “Fear” in his response to you. “When someone says they don’t feel safe it really gets our attention”? That doesn’t square very well with their attitude during Buttongate. And it’s a bit much to present subscriber visibility as a security enhancement, when all of their own arguments about the sharing buttons apply even more here – your content is always public whether someone’s subscribed to you or not.

I’d urge anyone writing a comment on the bots’ blog to express appreciation for the chance to give feedback before the change. A big part of the awfulness of Buttongate was that it was done with no warning or consultation, so a bit of positive reinforcement to the bots about talking to us first might stand us in good stead in the future.

I’ve been asking for this change since they first rolled out subscriptions. I understand that people may be afraid of the Fakebook like consequences of knowing who is following you, but you don’t have to look at it if you don’t want to. Like others above have said, we’re supposed to be adults and should behave like them.

I’d personally prefer to leave it as it is… I don’t want someone that I interact with regularly to offended if I don’t subscribe to him/her. Often times I subscribe to people I don’t normally “see” on a regular basis… they hang in a different circle and I’m afraid I’ll never see them again. There are tons of people I “follow” without subscribing too because we “run in the same cirlce”... I’ll never lose him/her… I go and visit their pages regularly… but also I guess to Todd’s point… this isn’t facebook so that type of concern of mine maybe wouldn’t be an issue with the type of people here. I know I wouldn’t feel offended.

And I don’t want people to know who I read either. It seems weird for this site, and more for those people who use it as a ‘social’ site. I like it for its goals and entries, and I read some people for different things. I don’t want to know who is following me, I don’t want to ‘write’ with people in mind. I want to be honest and authentic and not write for a known audience.

I like the anonymity. I also worry a little that I am subscribed to less than twenty, will people who are subscribed to me feel I’m being rude that I’m not subscribed back?? Gah!!!! I don’t want this to turn into a social obligation site.

So that my subscribers, whoever you may be, can see it as well…

Ok, forgive me, but I’m calling Bullshit on this one fellas.

“Fear: When someone tells us they don’t feel safe using 43 Things it really gets our attention.”

Really? Does it? See, I know it sounds good to say, but come on now, who are we fooling? You’re NUMBER 1 complaint over the years, is that there is NO privacy here. Lack of Privacy leads to people being afraid to post. Yet somehow that one always seems to fall on deaf ears, and is typically met with a rather smug “Well we never said this site was private, you’re using the site the WRONG way.”

Now, it’s your site, run it anyway you like, I won’t argue that. But spare me (us) this patronizing bullshit about this move being about your concern for your users fears.

Now, lets go over your numbers here a bit, shall we? You tout time and again the many tens of thousands of users you have on here. In fact, scroll up a little bit and theres this comment “Tens of thousands use the site to go public with their goals” Tens of thousands. Being conservative that means you have at least 20,000 users. Now, lets look at this comment… “we are being won over by the hundreds of requests we get each year”

Um…hundreds? Really? Out of tens of thousands, you have hundreds complain, each year..? Lets be generous, and say you get 500 complaints on this a year (cause you know if you were anywhere NEAR a thousand you’d have said “We get almost 1000 complaints each year…”)

Sooo, that breaks down to, what? .025% of your userbase? Mind you, thats not 25%, thats 2.5.

I’d be willing to bet you’ll get a higher percentage rate of complaints against this on this one thread alone than that.

But hey, like I said, it’s your website, do with it what you will. We’ve all seen how well that worked for our friend Tom

You created a website called 43things. Your users created the CULTURE

I don’t like this change. I’m a total subscription slut. Sometimes I subscribe to people for awhile, then wildly prune the list down to just a handful, then let it slowly creep up again if I see entries that make me curious. I don’t subscribe to some of my favourite people because they post so much that I miss lots of the entries from some of the rare birds I follow.

The impulsive, whimsical way I follow and unfollow people should really discourage anyone from reading much into their follower counts.

My “unsubscribing” from someone usually has more to do with some fleeting intention to spend less time reading entries on this site than it has to do with approval or disapproval.

...and I was going to post a comment on the blog. But what’s the point ? They don’t appear to care, and they’ll just go ahead and do it anyway.

and if it happens I might just be out of here for good.

Might as well call it Facebook and be done with it!