About Thoughts…

I have felt uneasy about the whole issue of whether I should stop being someone’s friend b/c of their lifestyle. I would feel like a hypocrite if I do so, you know? I have dropped one fave from my list, but that was because that person would write about sexual things most of the time. It took me a while, but I got around to talking to her again. I know not everyone would share the same views as I do. People will smoke, have sex, drink, or whatever. I am not perfect in any way, nor do I claim to be. I watch wrestling, I am attracted to feet for some reason, and I have a fetish I’m not too proud of having. I am still a very opinionated and open-minded person, so I apologize for coming off the wrong foot in that entry. Anyway, I’m going to post up this fellow diarist entry in here:

dear diary master… 8/21/2002

it’s been three days since i’ve emailed you (at the ONLY address listed on the diary import facility’ page), with a very specific request and concern, but with no reply. i don’t want to post what that request was here, and if you’d actually read the email i sent, you’d understand why. being that you’ve not replied however, i’ve no choice but to make a few complaints and assumptions.

i find it very unlikely that you’re receiving so many emails within the course of one day that you are unable to even reply with a short message stating that you intend to look into the problem, or at least acknowledge that you even read the email. but for the sake of my first complaint, let’s just say that maybe you do get that many emails. if that is in fact the case, then you’ve got two major problems. one, you must obviously not know what you’re doing, because with a community as small as this one, there’s absolutely no reason to have as many glitches and errors as what people would have to be complaining about. and two, if in fact there is that much more to manage in terms of this community, then you need get off your power trip, and begin distributing duties to other people capable and willing to keep this place running smoothly.

now if none of that is true, and there aren’t too many problems keeping you from to replying the emails sent to you, and you are in fact able to handle the few errors that happen here, i’ve got to ask you why it’s not being done. you created this site, therefore as long as you are solely in charge, it is your responsibility to maintain this site. if you’re personal life is preventing you from being here when you’re needed, perhaps you should consider either resigning, or as much as i wouldn’t like this, shutting down the site.

let’s consider the president for a brief moment. yes, this is a democracy, and we have various branches of the government, but all things considered, do we not understand him to be in charge of this country? i don’t want to hear if you think he’s doing a good or bad job. the country is still running. other than on 9/11, it hasn’t completely shut down without warning. and if a crisis comes along that needs attention, either the president or someone under him is available to handle the situation. why am i comparing you to him, you might ask? because he’s running the entire country, and you’re only managing an online community of less than ten thousand people. and he has to be ready twenty four hours of the day in case something major happens. no one here is asking for that. all i want, and i doubt i’m alone on this, is for you to pay just enough attention to this site to keep it up and running as it should be, either by taking a few hours out of each day and checking in with our community, or hiring a few people to do it for you.

i liked free open diary when i first found it. i like how this place looks, i’m used to how to navigate the site, most of our community members are harmless pleasant people. when the pay version was created, i was hesitant to jump in, but i did, and enjoyed the few extra benefits. but i’ve been losing interest in this place more and more as time passes. i have your diary on my favorites, and i enjoyed reading when you took the time to make something work the way you had intended it to. but i’d scroll down through the notes left on each entry, and so often i saw complaints that obviously weren’t being answered in emails. people were trying to reach you to resolve something, because it wasn’t being taken care of via more conventional methods, and what did you choose to do? you took away their ability to directly voice their complaints to you where they KNEW you’d read them. and we KNOW you read them, because not only were you very occasionally replying to some of those notes, but your whole reason for turning off your notes was because you were tired of reading so many complaints. it’d be like the president turning off his phone, and telling the country and his advisors that the only way they can reach him now is via a hand written request slipped under his door. it’s as if you’re losing interest in this place, or are realizing that you bit off a lot more than you can chew, but have too much pride to ask for help. and if either of those are the case, you’re going to be letting down a lot of people, as you already have begun doing. and it’s not like this is just some playtime message board, where we come to bitch and moan about the latest political or economic scandals. if a site like that were to suddenly announce that it would be shutting down, it would take nothing for the members to move elsewhere, even as a collective. and no one would take it too personally if they couldn’t post their latest petty grievances. but this is a diary site. more often than not, a diary is a person’s most prized possession. his/her diary is the only place where he/she can completely be him/herself. there are people here who care so much about their diary, their lives would be ruined if it were to find its way into the wrong hands.

so please, diary master, realize the responsiblity you have by being in charge of this online diary community. we don’t want to leave or lose this place, any more than you want to deal with the problems that come with creating a website as important as this one.

A Perfect Circle wrote that entry. In all actuality, I had read that entry before he noted me on my last entry.