LJ filter etiquette

[quietann]

Just so you all know... there are times that deguspice is on someone's filter, and I am not, or vice versa. We *attempt* not to read filtered messages meant for the other, but because we often use the same computer, sometimes stuff happens (and yeah, occasionally one of us will show the other a filtered post -- but with much discretion and deliberation beforehand.) If the other one obviously should NOT be reading the filtered post, we try not to let it happen. (I can only think of two or three instances where I felt making the effort to keep him from finding out something from a filter he's not on was necessary. I have no idea how many times he's done the same WRT me.)

We do keep each other's confidences; there is stuff we share with each other (often when one of us -- usually me -- is upset about something). We have our own little two-person hive mind up here in Andover. I've been known to gossip, but if Ben says "so-and-so told me this in confidence", my lips are sealed, and vice versa.

Under the rare circumstances when there is something you tell one of us that you *really* don't want the other one to know, it's best to say so.

Comments

[sebastian-tombs.livejournal.com]

I have a basic rule of assumption:

Assume that someone will know any secret that I have told their spouse. Unless I specifically need both to know, in which case I try to tell them both. If I really want the spouse not to find out, I believe that I must specify that myself.

It is just safer that way, it keeps the assumption in my court, and prevents potential misunderstandings.

[tamidon.livejournal.com]

I don't go out of my way to show Mark stuff, but in LJ, as in my marriage, anything said to me is not going to be hidden from my husband unless there is a really good reason.He keeps my confidences, and the reverse, but he usually hears about stuff that really bothers me. Just a matter of marital policy, but I try to be upfront about it.

[bethr.livejournal.com]

Yesterday I had one "my marriage sucks and here's why" post that I put Ben on and not you. That was only for your sake, though, because I thought he would be tolerant of it in a way that you might not be.

If there's one half of an LJ couple I don't really want to know about something, I've learned not to LJ at all, but rather send info privately. I have learned this the hard way.

Furthermore, I write something particularly unpleasant about my own husband, I've learned not to put certain people on that filter, because they have pretty loose e-lips.

[quietann.livejournal.com]

Ben gave me the basic rundown, but it was probably a good call on your part.

(you just have to somehow let him know if you don't want me to know about something. and on a recent something where I knew well before he did, he eventually figured it out and asked me. In general, if I am asked directly about something, I don't dissemble...)

[bethr.livejournal.com]

Ben gave me the basic rundown, but it was probably a good call on your part.

In my own life, if there's a particular situation that pisses me off, I don't need to know the specifics. It's plenty to know it's happening in general. So I just extrapolated to you.

About the other thing...anyone who reads both my posts and the comments to them would be bound to figure out something was up, esp. if the reader knew I was part of a community where that kind of thing was normative. The situational circumspection is not on my end, believe me---I've already got a rep.

[coraline]

yeah, that's about how eric and i operate, and i usually assume the same for other cohabiting/committed couples.

[marmota.livejournal.com]

I take it as given that couples do that (which reminds me, anyone else here use 'couple' in a broader sense to indicate all possible romantic combinations?). I'm not generally one for filtering posts, but I think I've managed to put all parts of known couples on the same ones. There have been times in the somewhat far past though where there were couples where the partner(s) I wasn't confiding in were people I had less trust in, and it definitely limited what I would say or write.

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

So noted. Though I can't think of much that I wouldn't want to tell one of you and not the other.

As for our situation, J steadfastly refuses to get his own LJ-account (the lazy lout busy guy; doesn't want another time-sink) and reads mine over my shoulder until I make him go away. But he's very respectful of 'girls-only' posts. Not unlike B, he's a mensch like that. ;-)

[madbodger.livejournal.com]

I know where you're coming from. Someone said "I have something to tell you
that you can't tell ANYONE." I explained that I tell fizzygeek most
everything, and for all practical purposes, we share one brain. They laughed
and said they just assumed that she'd know. But it's good to make sure.

[dancingdeer.livejournal.com]

I completely agree, and I never assume that someone's SO doesn't know something that I've told that person.
However, there's an interesting inverse, and that's never to assume that someone *has* told their SO something, or passed something on. The number of times I've missed events (this is slightly more in the past than now, but still..) because my SO was invited, and they'd assumed he'd pass it on to me, but he never did, is high.
Two people, one and a half brains. :)

[chhotii.livejournal.com]

If I had something to say to you that I didn't want Ben to find out, I would talk to you in person.

In general, if I have something to say to x that I don't want y to find out, I won't use LJ to communicate to x if x and y have any sort of relationship whatsoever-- romantic, non-romantic, live together, work together, etc.

I think relying on filters as any kind of real security is asking for trouble.

[deguspice.livejournal.com]

I think relying on filters as any kind of real security is asking for trouble.

About 20 years ago on Elbows (or 'Kin), JBVB advised that you should never send anything via email that you wouldn't want written on a billboard next to your house. It's a good piece of advice that I still try to keep in mind.