The games I used to play......

I'm amazed that Texas Hold 'em Poker has caught on like wildfire in the past couple of years. But then, card games have always been popular for years at a time -- poker, bridge, pinochle, euchre, gin rummy, Michigan rummy. It's a great way for folks to get together and socialize on a regular basis.

( As for me, I'm more of a board game person than a card game person. )

Friends don't let friends use Frienditto.

Been hearing a lot of buzz about Frienditto in the past several hours. On the surface, Frienditto appears to be a benign internet archive service. Where it really gets insiduous is that when people post restricted entries (such as a friends-locked LJ post) and provide Frienditto with their LJ password, it allegedly doesn't do the honorable thing and discard the password. Instead, it hangs on to it, uses it to riffle through a person's LJ account, and can see other people's friends-locked posts. This is a serious breach of confidentiality. Whether or not it actually does this is not known. But the potential for this is enough for me to raise the red flag. Especially considering allegations that Frienditto is affiliated with ljdrama.org.

While nothing on the internet is 100% private, people should do whatever they can to be in integrity with the trust that other people have given them.

My rule on friends-only posts: Whatever is said here stays here. Occasionally, people (including myself) slip up and make references to, or quote from, other people's friends-only posts. Depending on the intention, the amount quoted or referenced, and the frequency, my response would be anywhere from forgiveness to indignation.

And if you have used Frienditto, notify me and I will take appropriate action.

I got the scoop from redaxe, jslove, and bikergeek.

Spread the word.

Frienditto takedown! LJ users strike back!

There is now an LJ community -- ditto_cops -- which contains a list of LJ users and communities which had posts on Frienditto. (This supercedes ditto_cop.)

Check to see if anyone you know is on this list. Then thwap 'em with a herring. Then give 'em a boot to the head. Then defriend 'em. Then change your LJ password.

Thanks and a tip of the hat to arkady for pulling an all-nighter in compling this list.

And while you're at it, enable the "spiderbot killer" in your settings so that search engines and their little daemonic minions don't grab your posts and make them available for everyone to see. (I know, it sounds like closing the barn door after the horse has left, especially if you'd had an LJ for a while and/or posted frequently.)

In other news, the Frienditto site was hacked but good, but it came back up a few hours later. Now they're asking for donations to cover bandwith and legal costs.