Let's chat, shall we? Please, sit. Please. No, really. I insist.

We've had some problems on this site as of late, and frankly, it's starting to annoy me and a lot of other people who are valued posters on this site. I am speaking, of course, about the so-called "hijacking" of diaries. And before you start calling me "pot," I will freely admit that, in the past, I have been as guilty of this as anyone. That said, this practice has got to stop.

I know that many of us have come from other blogs, and hence are familiar with the "open thread" diaries. For those of you who don't know, the open thread is generally a diary where you can post, at all hours of the day and night, about whatever pops into your head. Do you fear North Korea? Have an opinion about which flavor of Pop Tarts is tastier? Want to report suspected subliminal messaging during "Fairly Oddparents?" Then the open thread is the place for you.

In this vein, we created the "Non-Baseball Diary," which has since morphed into the "OBD" last May, in order to combat this very problem. For those of you that were around then, you will remember some of the better diaries (and sometimes the game diaries) would often devolve into a mess of movie quotes, personal anecdotes, and something that resembled an online singles bar.

As of late, it seems that, every night, some unfortunate diary becomes the victim of unruly hijackers. As one of the more prolific diary posters here, I can tell you that it really sucks when you put some thought into a diary, and wake up to find that there are 200 + comments on a diary, only to discover upon opening it that most of the comments have nothing to do with what you've written about (see my meltdown on the Smack Talk diary for more on how this makes a diary poster's head explode).

All that said, enough. Okay? The OBD is there for a reason; to direct all the OT traffic into one area so it doesn't pollute other threads. Frankly, Al and I are starting to get emails from a lot of diary posters who are upset about what is happening to their diaries. Diaries take time to write, and it's not fair to their authors to take them over talking about, well. . . basically nothing. To be honest, it's making this site more reminiscent of cubs.com and it's driving valued posters away. So feel free to hijack the OBD till the cows come home, but leave the other diaries alone.

In the same vein, before you post a diary, please think about whether or not it actually merits a diary. We're getting a lot of diaries lately, consisting of a couple of lines, asking people what they think our lineup will be or whether we think Wood and Prior will be healthy. That's not diary material; that's worthy of a comment on a related thread.

Also, please at least try to convey something about the subject matter of the diary in your diary title. Sometimes we get 5 diaries on the same topic because the first diary posted has a funny title, but not one that tells people what it's about.

I'm not posting this to pick on anyone, but rather to let you guys know that, as much fun as we have here, it's starting to cause problems. Please try to be considerate of other posters.

The season is starting. There's going to be a lot more to talk about. Let's all have fun and keep other people's feelings in mind.

Thanks.

[editor's note, by Al] Julie & I had a discussion about this topic this morning and she offered to make this post, to which I add my complete agreement. Let's all have fun, enjoy posting about the Cubs and baseball and when appropriate, other topics. Thanks from me too.