Some don't like the look, some think the content is compromised, some think Salon's going from something rare to something slick and trendy.

I'm all of them. I think there's some sort of weird weight bearing down on the editorial imagination, and readers are losing out.

Think about what an extraordinary thing it would have been if George Bush and the neocons had lined up and said, We made a terrible mistake. We've let you down. We didn't think it through, and we ignored ... intelligence.

BE LIKE THAT! Show them how it's done!

(Or if this is wasted breath, please, just choose good writing.) Pick amazing writers first, then the topics, and that will guide you.

I'm with A Reader and others who express skepticism about this proposal. I mostly come to salon for hard news from a different or more in-depth angle than is offered in mainstream media. In the last little while, there seems to have been less of this in favor of softer pieces. The harder news stories are still there, but the ratio is slipping. The proposal doesn't sound like it provides anything that can't be found in many other venues: livejournal, tabletalk. I'm concerned about financial resources being diverted to this new project and away from the what keeps me in a salon premium subscription. I would MUCH rather see the money go into reporting rather than another community opinion option.

I can't take the survey (firefox/linux/noscript extension), so let me post my comments here:

Salon does NOT need more content. The web is full of content, I believe your readers can find it.

I read Salon because this is where I find news that I do not find elsewhere, with a tone that I like. So I would like Salon's limited resources to be allocated to more investigative journalism, and to more columnist that comment on topics that are treated elsewhere whith a tone that I can't find elsewhere. In short more stories about ethically challenged judges, and more King Kaufman.

I would most likely avoid any blog section, after all people who publish successful blogs do this on their site, where they can get the ads cash for their work. If one of your reader sends consistently good letters, that are appreciated by the readers (a rating system WOULD be a nice addition to the site), then hire her. One of the most important job of a newspaper is filtering the news, sorting out what's important from what is not. By publishing indiscriminately a huge amount of content, you would be giving up on this function.

I agree with others who appreciate Salon for its unique approach to news we can't find clearly analyzed elsewhere. I hope it will continue this good work. I'm not sure what demographics you're looking for, but I'm middle-class, white, married, taxpayer who drives a gas guzzler; in short, probably mainstream.

I don't want this site to turn into blogs and podcasts. I can get that in many other places. I'm copying what I wrote in the survey, also:

I came to Salon.com desperately searching for good, broad, interesting writing on all subjects and I don't think that this idea is going to work. It feels like you're jumping on a bandwagon that's going to take a corner and fling you off the side into the dust. Leave it to DailyKos, a site that has a formula that works.

I'm already on livejournal and I've wandered over to Table Talk from time to time. I don't need to read the writings of other people just going about their days.

If this site becomes all blogs/podcasts/videos & pictures, I will let my subscription lapse, sorry. I don't like to pull out the "I'll cancel if you do this" blackmail, but I'm telling you what I really think. Please keep the excellent writing by professionals. I'll go to DailyKos if I want to read good blogging by enthusiasts or livejournal if I want to check out what my buddies are doing.

P.S.: I'd love it if Salon had an arts writer from time to time who actually knew about the arts.

"It is a common delusion that you make things better by talking about them"

Please, no more blogs, no more feeble amateurish content. There are plenty of locations already available for people who feel the need to spew their guts over every triviality that occurs in their miserable lives. Enough already!

I want to say that part of the reason there's no need for more blog content etc. is that you have made excellent improvements of late. Making it so easy to add letters, and then also having the editors come in and *rate* the letters, so that if you are in a hurry you can just read the editor's choices, that's brilliant.

The only of your new ideas that might be useful is making it easier to link to or upload non-text media, but I think it should be kept in the context of (public) letters to the editors or journalists. Then the editors and journalists can decide whether to follow the leads up with full stories, just like editors and journalists always have.

I agree with some others: something has changed at Salon, and not for the better.

I remember when Salon first started requiring payment, I was annoyed. I resisted subscribing. Then I thought about the quality of what I was reading, how edgy and in-depth the stories were, how different from other sources. I plunked down the money.

I recall smiling at this simplistic comparison: The headlines and teasers on the right side of the screen (the Salon content), compared to the headlines/teasers on the left (from the AP Wire, which also appear on every other online news site). Even at the headline level, the Salon content was always more substantive. Reading its stories was even better: informative, thought-provoking, sometimes maddening, but usually well-done and worth paying for.

Fast forward... to now.

Currently showing on the AP Wire(left), the Top 5: IAEA Reports Iran to Security Council; National Guard Plan; Gonzales' History of Supporting Bush; The Haiti Elections. And one fluff story: Courtney Love says she's off drugs. 4 out of 5 ain't bad. The only problem is that I know the AP wire stories have little substance, basically reporting facts with no context or analysis. This is why I (used to) turn to Salon for more.

But what do I find from Salon? Here's its Top 5: "I Like to Watch" (Flavor Flav, Jeff Probst, et. al., about how to find the perfect man), "Refuge in Bleak House" on Masterpiece Theater, "Video Dog" ("Brokeback Mountain" and bad sitcoms), "Ask the Pilot" (interesting/unusual but not top-bill material), and one potentially substantive story: "Talkin' bout my generation," looking at the after-baby-boom generation.

I look up to the "sections" links, and see A&E, Books, Comics, Community, Life, News & Politics, Opinion, Sports, Tech & Business, Letters. Why does this sound like I'm reading "USA Today?" (No, that's not a compliment!) If we're changing or adding categories, why not "philosophy", "science", "religion" -- something I'd never see anywhere else?

While Salon talks out one side of its mouth about valuing input from its users, more and more of its content reflects and imitates the mass-media world in which readers/viewers/consumers are valued simply as receptive eyeballs for advertising. Could it be that the "advertising" mode of Salon access is driving its content more than the subscription side? That's what it looks like to me.

So, yes; I'm ALL FOR an interactive and user-oriented Salon. That means making a choice in favor of Salon's subscriber-supported userbase. It means treating your users like intellectuals and giving them content worthy of their potential investment. It means recognizing that each and every subscriber gives you money because we want something different than what we could find elsewhere.