You may have noticed some changes to Kotaku this morning. Specifically to how important you have become to the site.
While commenters have always had a huge amount of influence on the shape of Kotaku, starting today that's even more true.
In the past we've always insisted that tips and letters to the editor are sent in by email and mediated by our editors; that discussions stay on topics that we determine; and that our writers are the only ones who can initiate stories on the site. No longer.
With the launch of Kotaku Open Forums, we're allowing readers to post tips, screens, game cheats, amateur reviews and walkthroughs directly from a front page form. Readers can also initiate discussions on any topic they choose simply by including a Twitter-style hashtag in their post. And commenters can expand on a story, or rebut a post, just as now.
While our daily Talk Amongst Yourselves will continue to run each morning, now you can create your own discussion groups and forums to talk about just about anything.
And of course you can still respond directly to a post or another comment. Now, though, keeping track of those discussions has become easier with alerts you can receive from the site. And have no worries, we will still keep a close eye on the comment threads connected to stories. So read our FAQ.
We have no idea what uses people will make of these open forums. But we suspect that many of them will be fantastic.