FAQ - Community Management

To create a community, you begin by creating a new journal account in the usual manner (http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=104). The new account is separate from your existing personal account, which will continue to represent you as an individual and as the person who maintains (controls) the new community. The username you choose for the new account will become the username of the community, and must not already be in use by any other user or community.

Once you've created the new account, you can proceed to the Create Community page (http://www.livejournal.com/community/settings.bml?mode=create), where you can convert the new account into a community. You will need to be logged in as the account that will become the community maintainer (http://www.livejournal.com/login.bml), and the journal you are converting to a community must not have any entries in it. At the Create Community page, under the "Community Account" section, enter the username and password for the account you want to convert to a community. You can change most of the community's settings while you're logged in as the community's maintainer.

While you're turning your new account into a community, you can also set options which will affect how other users are admitted into your community. See http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=79 for more information on those options.

When you create a community (http://www.livejournal.com/community/settings.bml?mode=create), you are asked to specify the following options:


MEMBERSHIP

A community's membership may be either open or closed. In an open community, any user can go to the Community Info page and join by using a link near the top of the page. In a closed community, prospective members must email the maintainer a request to join the community; if approved, the maintainer must add the user to the community's memberlist.


POSTING ACCESS

When Posting Access is granted to "All Members", any user who becomes a member is automatically permitted to add entries to the community journal. When Posting Access is granted only to "Select Members", no one can add an entry to the community journal until the maintainer has given them permission individually.


NON-MEMBER POSTING

If "Non-Members Can Post", any LiveJournal user can post to the community journal by visiting the community's Community Info page (http://www.livejournal.com/userinfo.bml?user=communityname, where communityname is the name of the community) and clicking the blue pencil in the small blue toolbar.

If "Non-Members Cannot Post", then users must first join the community in order to post to it. If this option is selected in combination with "Select Members" for posting access, the maintainer must individually give each member access to post in the community journal.


MODERATION

If submissions to the community are "Unmoderated", entries that users post to the community will immediately be placed in the community journal. If submissions are "Moderated", potential entries must first be approved by a user designated as a moderator before they will appear. For more information about community moderation, please see http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=157.


A community's maintainer can change these options at any time by simply going to http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml, and clicking the "Settings" link corresponding to the community. The next page will allow you to change any of these settings.

A community's maintainer can grant membership and/or posting access to individual users through the Community Management page (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml). For more information on maintaining a community after you've created it, see http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=80.

First of all, as the community's maintainer, you don't have to do anything if you created the community using the "Open Membership" option with posting access given to "All Members". These options allow any LiveJournal user to obtain membership and posting access in your community without seeking your approval.

When you create a community, you decide whether membership will be open or closed, and whether all members will have posting access (http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=79). If later you change your mind about how those options should be set, you need to go back to http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml and edit the Settings for the appropriate community.

If you allow members to join, but want to grant posting access individually, you can do this via the Community Management page (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml). Access the "Members" link. Here, you can grant posting access to existing members.

If you've deliberately made your community a closed community, or you don't allow all of your members to post, then you can grant individual users access to your community using the Community Management page (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml).

Select the "Members" link for the community you wish to work with. At the bottom of the page (or the last page, if your community has multiple pages of members), you will have the ability to grant a user access to your community.

Input their username into the text box available, and check off the capabilities you want them to have. Once you submit these changes, the users will be e-mailed to request their approval. If they wish to be added to the community, they will follow a link which will add them to the community. Otherwise, they will not be added.

Only the community's maintainer can remove or ban a member from that community.

By selecting the "Members" link for the appropriate community here: http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml, you can remove membership and posting access. This can also be used to add new maintainers or to remove existing maintainers (see: http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=100 for more details).
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The maintainer can also log in and remove or ban a user through the Admin Console (http://www.livejournal.com/admin/console/). You will need to be logged in as the maintainer of the community, not the community itself, for the following commands to function.

Do not enter the < or > symbols; these are only for reference purposes. Replace <community> and <user> with the username of the community and the username of the user, respectively.

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To remove membership and posting access to a community, execute the following command:

community <community> remove <user>

Note, however, that if your community allows anyone to join, anyone you remove from the community can re-join the community. Banning a member, however, will keep the member from re-joining the community. See http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=79 for your options regarding open and closed communities.

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To remove posting access, execute the following command:

shared <community> remove <user>

If your community is set to allow anyone to join and allows all members to have posting access, anyone whose posting access you remove can leave the community and re-join the community to get posting access again. Banning a member, however, will keep that member from posting into the community.

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To ban a user from your community, execute the following command:

ban_set <user> from <community>

Banning a user from your community does not remove them from the community, but the user will not be able to comment or post into the community. However, If you remove a user from the community and also ban them, they will not be able to rejoin.

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To unban a user from your community, execute the following command:

ban_unset <user> from <community>

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As an example, to remove user gooner from the lj_userdoc community, the command would be:

community lj_userdoc remove gooner

If you no longer want to maintain a community, you will first need to work out an agreement with another member to transfer the community to them. Once a new maintainer has been chosen, go to the Community Management page (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml) and click the "Members" link. Here you can select the checkbox for the "Maintainer" status of the member you've chosen, and deselect the checkbox for your own "Maintainer" status.

You will also need to give the community password to the new maintainer. Before giving the password to the new maintainer, you may wish to change the password if the current password is not one you would want the new maintainer to know. The new maintainer may also want to change the password after receiving the community. For information about how to change the community password, see http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=18.

You can use the same method to add a co-maintainer to your community. Follow the same process as described above, but don't deselect your own "Maintainer" checkbox. Once a member has been added as a co-maintainer, they will have the same maintainer privileges as you currently do.

If you no longer want your community, you have three options. You can either transfer maintainership of the community to another user, revert your community back to a personal journal, or delete the community.

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To transfer maintainership of the community to another user, follow the instructions given in http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=100.

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To revert your community back to a personal journal, you will need to go to the Admin Console (http://www.livejournal.com/admin/console/) and execute the following command.

change_journal_type <community> person

Do not enter the < or > symbols; these are only for reference purposes. Replace <community> with the username of the community you wish to convert.

As an example, to revert the lj_userdoc community to a personal journal, the command would be:

change_journal_type lj_userdoc person

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To delete your community, follow the same procedure as for deleting a personal journal (http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=16). You will need to select your community's username from the "Work as user" menu and click "Switch" before you can delete your community. Please note that the community should not be an official LiveJournal community.

Community Moderation is a feature designed to help stop off-topic or abusive entries in communities. If the moderation feature is enabled for your community, any time a new entry is made, a notification is sent to the community's moderator(s). In the notification, there is a link to a page where the moderators can approve or reject the entry. Until the entry is accepted, it is not visible to the other community members. If the entry is accepted, a notification will be sent to the poster informing them that it was accepted. If the entry is rejected, the entry will be completely deleted; the poster will receive a notification with the full text of their entry and the reason why the request was rejected, if the moderator chose to give one.

To enable the moderation feature on your community, you must go to the Community Management area (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml). Next, click the "Settings" link next to the community that you wish to moderate. Under the "Moderation" heading, select the "Moderated" option. Then click the "Update Settings" button. Now, your community is moderated.

Once your community is moderated, the current maintainer of the community will automatically be designated as the community moderator. If there are multiple community maintainers, the maintainer who switched the community to moderated will be designated as the moderator. You may wish to designate other members as moderators, or remove the maintainer as a moderator. To do this, you must go back to the Community Management area (http://www.livejournal.com/community/manage.bml). Then, next to the moderated community, go to the "Members" area. You will see a list of all the members in your community. Now, check the "Moderator" checkbox next to the username of each member that you wish to make a moderator. If you wish to remove the maintainer as a moderator, uncheck the "Moderator" checkbox next to the username of the maintainer.

Another option is to give a member Unmoderated status. This means that that member's entries are automatically approved and are visible to the other community members as soon as they are posted. To give a member Unmoderated status, choose the "Unmoderated" checkbox next to that member's username. Once you are finished with all moderation changes in the Community Members area, click the "Update Settings" button. A moderator can also give a user "Unmoderated" status after approving an entry made by this user.