Dear Brad,
There are some new url's in my LJ:
LJVAR.imgprefix = "http://stat.livejournal.sup.com/img"
LJVAR.statprefix = "http://stat.livejournal.sup.com".

I suppose that these addresses are relevant to SUP. Am I right?
If your answer is "Yes", can I decline using these servers for my LJ rightnow or ever? I have a paid account and now I don't want to use anything concerning with SUP.
If your answer is "No", why can I see "sup" word in these addresses?

Thank you.

Just in case: I'm not a paranoiac. Upon my life:)!

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You're only supposed to get those URLs if your IP address is from a netblock registered near Moscow. We have some bug where sometimes we don't reset the imgprefix/statprefix and the following request (for somebody anywhere in the world) gets those URLs also, even when they shouldn't, and SUP is disappointed in this and wants us to fix it, and we do too, but I haven't had time to find the bug yet. But it is a bug.

And I agree, this isn't the best routing decision (just looking at the IP address alone), but it works pretty well. When I was in Moscow the second time in December, using LiveJournal was *so* much faster than when I was there in October.

The reason it's "sup.com" at the end and not, say, "moscow.stat.livejournal.com" (which we could've done), is because if it's sup.com, then SUP doesn't get your *.livejournal.com cookies.

And no, there's no way to turn this off yet, but it wouldn't be hard to add such a switch and I can imagine we can do it if even people want it.

Also, realize that these URLs are for all users in Moscow, not just "Cyrillic" users or whatever... so when I'm in Moscow, I get sup.com URLs. When I'm in San Francisco, I get livejournal.com URLs.

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Can we post off-topic comments here? :-)

Well, as I don't seem to have any particular questions about SUP, let me ask such question:

How large is your ban_list? :-)

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What are you waiting from the coming New Year? :)

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SUP homey?

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Dear LazyBrad,

How do I get tomato sauce off of leather?

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Many thanks for mutual understanding! You really the social guru and many people should study at you!

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1. As I (tried to) ask in that post: wouldn't it be a good idea to show people (many of whom are, surprisingly) software engineers, a link to SVN that shows where exactly that flag is set and where is it used, so that even the most unbelieving Thomases will be finally persuaded?

2. Are there any news about that bug that showed sup.com links to people all over the globe?

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Here's my understanding of the whole SUP thing.

6Apart does mark certain accounts eligible for SUP offers. The decision appears to be based on use of cyrillic alphabet for posts/comments. 6Apart does not wish to reveal that criteria, let the owner of the journal to know about this (since you disabled access to the relevant script) or remove that designation.

Is that correct? Are there plans to let the lj users remove that sup flag?

Please understand that I'm not about to question the policy or start a flamewar. I want to make a decision for myself based on correct first-hand information.

Thanks,

NS

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When will I be able to fetch LJ posts using SUP?

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Dear Brad,
How many chickens must i sacrifice to be granted a spot on your friends list?
SideOffer, would you take a sister in lieu of chickens? people say she's a hottie, but i can't start thinking that was as we currently live in alabama and i dont want to fall into the "inbred" trap.

sincerely yours,
Valis Keogh
CEO
Valis Enterprises
http://www.valissoft.com

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Question: honestly, how amazed are you with the whole SUP controversy? :)

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since i can't check anymore, did my response help you with the mmap problem? maybe you could post a summary.

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I just had to laugh at this post. Maybe it will solve it so you can have a regular journal. :( Hope it works.

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Dear Brad,

the problem is that there are links to the protected post in hundreds places in LJ --- don't you think that screening it really does harm to the connectivity of the information resources? You probably realize now that your collaboration with SUP really influences situation, and that people --- at least those who still want to think that you're able to understand their strong feelings against SUP --- are trying to talk with you :-) I strongly wish you to stay calm and wish you good luck, though the last day made me think again of transferring my blog away from the SUP...

Regards,
Vladimir Dotsenko

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Is it possible to decline the SUP support and be able to use the Livejournal service provider as before? What if I pay for it?

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What keeps confusing me, and reading below is making that even more so, is what does this deal do/encompass/whatever. Technically that is. Below I've seen you say:

- stuff about opt-in extra services under a sup.com name, branded with an lj name. Nobody should get worried about that, and this is clear, IMO.
- the setting of an internal flag about whether you seem to be 'Russian'. From reading that, it isn't clear to me what the effect of this flag is. Text seems to suggest first it's 'just for counting', but then why does it still exist? You've counted them now, right?
- And then there is the serving/reading/whatever-it-is of lj journals (public, friends, private etc entries and all) through a sup.com domain, like you did in Moscow.
You say this sup domain helps with them not accessing your lj cookies (I suppose the reasoning is: sup.com is under their control, if if they are bad, they still can't get your cookies so they can't do bad things?). Ok, but then how were you reading/posting to your lj faster then before, via lj.sup.com, without lj.sup.com having access to your lj cookies? And to your entries?
This is basis of my not-understanding: what is sup doing here? Running a big proxy/memcache? In that case: that proxy/memcache things already contain private entries... and you'll just have the same cookies but under the lj.sup.com name no? And if it's not, how come lj.sup.com is so much faster? If I knew what sup was doing at a technical level, I (and many others) could probably answer these myself: * if sup were bad, and if I'm in Moscow, can sup read all the private posts I make? The friends only posts of others that I read? (Like any other proxy/hub along the way, or the KGB monitoring the lines from Moscow to the USA, could do I guess).
* and if so, is that indeed the ONLY thing they can do? Won't they (potentially) have my password as soon as I type it into the login box I see at lj.sup.com?

Note: I'm not Russian, just interested.

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I couldn't care less about SUP; however, I do find nmap() facinating, did I miss anything interesting?

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What'sup?

Also, did you get in any more taxi related incidents (just to be suitably offtopic here)

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Hi Brad,

How about visiting StPete, Russia? I'll show you the Hermitage.

PS. no sex plz

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Brad, any room left on your friends list? Apparently, I'm not on it ... :-)

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Not a question, just a quick opinion here.

I am bilingual and had been living in the US since before you were born (yes!), so my connection to Russia is quite tenuous. My LJ is English-only, although some of my comments are in Russian.

I do not know anything about sup and do not have an opinion about them but I noticed that they are not the only ones who suck at communicating with customers.

This whole brouhaha could have been avoided with more communication and transparency on the US side, your side.
As it was, the lack of reliable info had allowed wild rumors to form and circulate.

The way users' concern are handled is a PR disaster. The idea flagging some US-based profiles "sup" is ill-conceived as it looks much like ethnic profiling to me. When users' access to this page is abruptly shut off as soon as the cat is out of the bag - it is a lot worse, a terrible PR. I do not know whether you (6apart that is) do have anything to hide but you certainly act as if you do.

Erasing people's comments and telling them to stay away from your journal has the same effect of fanning these flames -like it or not, but people perceive you as a face of LJ, not just another private user.

So you guys on the American side have so far greatly undermined your own credibility in my (and others') eyes. It is not really about sup, as far as I am concerned, but rather about your own handling of the situation. So far, it does not inspire much confidence, although I am talking more about perceptions than about facts.

I do have to tell you that this thread is about the only exception to this PR calamity - thanks for starting it.

I did not mince words here, but I hope you'll find this comment to be useful.

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I guess it's a "good" question - whom does my attorney sue for ethnical/language profiling - 6 Apart or SUP, or both?

Thanks

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I am curious to know why, if this was meant to flag accounts as SUP-eligible, it read as "SUP user" in the same manner as people are tagged a Paid user or having extra userpic space on that page, instead of something like "SUP eligible". Was it just something that happened without a second thought?

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