For starters, Defamer isn't going anywhere. True, it's undergone a series of drastic physical transformations over the years—starting out as a skinny, fresh-faced L.A. dirt rag, growing eventually into a full-service showbiz-skewering media hub, and now evolving into its current incarnation as Gawker's Hollywood dispatch—but you can still come here daily for all your salacious showbiz gossip needs.

But if it's specifically the voices of outgoing editors Seth, STV, and Kyle you seek, there is another option coming down the pipeline. This Spring, the three of us will have the pleasure of launching—or rather re-launching—Movieline magazine as a pop culture site: Movieline.com. For the new generation of studio stapler-dodgers among you, Movieline was a must-read back in the '90s—a Cahiers du cinéma on crack that was unabashedly in love with the movies, but never reluctant to stick it to the Hollywood Man. We think it's time to bring it back, with a wider breadth of pop culture coverage. Shoot us your e-mail addresses for updates about the launch.

Choices! Everybody loves choices! High five!

• Movieline.com

So we'll take a moment to remind you that you always have the option to read Defamer in the more traditional, "chubby" layout. All you need to do is select "Expanded" view from the dropdown menu near the top of the homepage, instead of "Condensed." See? All the content, none of the clutter. It's like an Angela Lansbury-administered sponge bath for the mind.

If you're not willing to subject yourself to the new, easy-to-use audition system, for fear of rejection or what have you, there's a second attractive option at the bottom of every post that allows you to sign in through your Facebook account and comment that way.

Here are the pluses: Your comment will automatically go up, circumventing any approval waiting period. (Kind of like gun-shopping in Wyoming!) Also, you won't have to upload an avatar. Instead, your Facebook profile pic will appear next to your comment, accompanied by The Mark of the F—a crest that's sure to win the admiration of the regular Defamer commenting community, some of whom have been here for years and spilled literal blood to obtain their status.

Here are the minuses: Your real name, or whatever it is you use on Facebook, will appear next to your comments. No anonymity here! Be prepared then for other commenters to dive into your profile and use that information against you.

Also: We still reserve the right to ban you, which is even more humiliating when everyone knows who you are. As far as we understand, however, you can still go about your regular Facebook activities should that come to pass, i.e. status updating "John Suchn'such is telling the know-it-all shmucks at Defamer to suck my wang!"

We look forward to hearing what all you vampire-slaying, snowball-throwing, poke-obsessives have to say. Just keep it smart and funny, or you get the boot.

Carry on!

One other change we neglected to mention was that unapproved commenters' submissions now appear directly beneath the posts, invisible to the public until we approve them. So go ahead and add a comment if you have something funny, smart and/or insightful to add to the discussion.

Examples of comments that will not be approved: Typo corrections; attempts at showcasing one's creative writing prowess or extensive vocabulary; long-winded defenses of orphan-collecting starlets and the men who love them; general filth and unseemliness.

Examples of comments that will be approved: Ones demonstrating some actual Hollywood insider knowledge; jokes we haven't already rejected for being too obvious and/or unfunny; wise observations that make us reassess our concept of reality, and our larger place in the universe.

Once you're approved, you'll have commenter access not just at Defamer, but at sites throughout the Gawker Media Network. So get commenting!

While you graciously said nothing, even as our waists expanded to genital-obscuring sizes and we started to shop at the "telecommuter leisurewear" section of Lane Bryant, we knew in our hearts that something needed to be done. Well, voila! And welcome to the new us. Don't worry about how we achieved it, just tell us we look amazing.

If you're wondering how this affects your daily Defamer read, it only enhances it, offering easy, skimmable access to a whole 24-hour posting cycle.

Some things to look for:

· Regular posts now have shorter ledes, and smaller, bolded headlines.
· High-priority stories will be designated "top" stories and get large headlines.
· If all you see is a line of text and a topic tag in a grey box to the left, go ahead and click it. A full post awaits you, and all the delights that entails. (It merely means we've exceeded the 35-word first-paragraph limit, resulting in a painful but not lethal jolt to our ankle-shackles.)
· Breaking, super-duper high-priority stories are designated "alert" stories, and will appear on a black background with white text, with an even larger headline. If you submit your e-mail address in the sidebar on the lower-left, these stories will be e-mailed to your throughout the day. Don't be left out of the cafeteria gossip!

Still with us? No? You're confused and hungry, and all this technical jargon is holding up the delicious babies-and-lox spread in the conference room? Well, we think we can help you, too:

· You see the menu bar at the top of the page, where it says "View?" By merely choosing the "Expanded" option, you'll get the chubby Defamer layout you're accustomed to.

What have we left out? Ah yes, those adorable little icons to the right of each headline.

· The clock, as you might have guessed, is a visual representation of time, i.e. when the post went up. In more recent posts, the clock will turn a deep shade of pink, probably out of embarrassment.
· The little fireball that wandered in from Donkey Kong tells you how many people have read this post. It lights up at 10,000—which in turn starts a Rube Goldberg contraption that delivers us a nourishing food pellet. So please, make every post reach 10,000! Our tiny new stomachs can now only handle portions the size of a kalamata olive.
· The dialogue bubble icon indicates numbers of comments. That fills in once 100 people have commented on a story—so there's some incentive for you, too.

Well, that about covers it! Wasn't that fascinating? If you find you're running into trouble with the new layout, send in your bugs, comments, complaints, and suggestions to Gawker Media Tech, or to us. Our 24-hour service hedgehogs are awaiting your calls.

He was promptly crisped. New Gawker intern James Frey was dispatched with a spatula to take care of the issue, and we understand things are running to speed. That is all. [Defamer Diary]

If you follow other commenters by clicking the heart beneath their user name, turning it red, all their comments will appear in their full, singeingly witty glory. (We can also solve the problem by awarding you star status, which also gives you top priority; we promise to do more of that around here, just as soon as we receive the cupcake gift baskets you have undoubtedly already called in for delivery.) Also, if you haven't yet discovered the exciting "Feedback" link at the bottom of our homepage, we invite you to do so immediately. Simply inputting your Defamer-related frustration or suggestion will whisk it off via pneumatic intertube to HQ, whereupon one of our 24-hour service hedgehogs will instantly leap into action to address it. That is all! Carry on.

Firstly, we lost our fearless leader Mark Graham—whom we lovingly referred to as "Den Mama" and "King Pookie," in addition to his official alias, "Uncle Grambo." Mark took on an intimidating job and performed it admirably, injecting the site with fresh ideas and energy. As such he will be missed. But fret not, as he is indubitably on to bigger and better things. (We understand he's already in talks to swoop in and fill the charitable-grocery void left by the recent death of an American acting legend, with a planned "Grambo's Own" line of salad dressings and lemonade.)

Another wonderful thing lost: Defamer video editrix, To Do anchorperson, and the closest thing we have to a mascot around here, Molly McAleer. This was rough, as we loved Molly like the sister we never had. True, we have two sisters, but neither of them is anything like Molly. The good news is that she is with us for two more weeks—plenty of time for a few more Hostess snack-cake bingings and bike-by clownings for the road. When she becomes famous (TV famous, not just internet famous), we'll be proud to say her launching pad was right here. Her chihuahua sidekick Wagandstuff, meanwhile, is already on his way, having been booked for the upcoming season of Celebrity Apprentice. Go get 'em, Wags!

Everyone's favorite moment-of-zen-inducer Douglas Reinhardt was our final casualty. His mastery of the art of photo-captioning was regularly on display in our recurring feature, A Call to the Bullpen. The good news is he'll be with us for the next two weeks as well—and maybe even longer, if we can convince him to work for worthless Gawker Media stock.

So where does that leave us? Well, for starters, I'm still here. So is our crack senior editor S.T. VanAirsdale, and our latest proud addition, associate editor Kyle Buchanan. Sure, we're a little down over the loss of our friends, but we're fully committed to sustaining the constant output of Hollywood headlines, scurrilous gossip, and general nonsense that has come to define the Defamer brand. So stick around! You might just wind up having fun.

Seth

I was going to compile some sort of Best Of, but it's a fool's task. Here's a better idea: Crack open a bottle of André, click here, and curl up for an hour or five with his mind. It's a beautiful one.

Magical Defamer video gnome Molly McAleer has put together a visual goodbye, craftily calibrated to reduce Mark and his fans—every last one of you!—into a blubbering puddle of salty tears. It's sheer poetry.

From all of us here at Defamer:

Goodbye Mark. We love you.