I'd never really looked at Live journal before, except sometimes when Ovid would mention something about it.
Today my curiousity got the better of me, and I spent some time looking around. All I can conclude is that it's Usenet with a browser interface. The communities are newsgroups without an "alt." in front, and the members are made-up names.
Did I miss something?
LJ certainly seems like that, but there is a big difference: different newsgroups don't necessarily become the province of a single person. If I regularly read a few groups, I might learn something about the topic at hand, but in the case of LJ, that topic is frequently a friend. I really appreciate that because it allows me to easily keep in touch with friends strewn across the world.
Also, given that I tend to be horrible about writing email, I just update my journal once and everyone who has access to it can find out about what's going on in my life. This certainly is not an interface that everyone enjoys (and I certainly limit what I put in there), but it's really not too different from the purpose that one's use.perl journal might serve.
But apparently, having someone pop up out of the blue to comment on a topic is considered "rude" by the LJ'ers. Apparently, they want you to get to know them first before you help them. It's more of a tribal thing. They were suspicious of me, particularly because all I was doing was commenting on other blogs, and not ever blogging myself. I guess they didn't know enough to check my use.perl journal.
It's definitely a different culture, to be a blogger, from being a web-community (like perlmonks or Usenet). Beware the differences.
