I'm one of those who rarely provides feedback online, primarily because I'm caught between being horrified at how nasty and off-base some people are with their remarks and admiration for those providing further insight. When I read the comments, I often find I am far, far away from what the article's intentions were to begin with! I'd hate to see the "flattening out" that you referred to, but it's very easy to understand why that would appeal to some. It's easier to provide negative feedback from the anonymity of the internet than give positive feedback, the same way as it's easier to proof-read someone else's writing. I for one however rely on the integrity of the originating author to provide honest, factual information - but always read with some skepticism. If I do read any comments, I know I'll have to wallow through the wingnuts and skepticism is at an all-time high. I hope there is help within the industry available these days for writers to extract the benefits of replies without being consumed/destroyed by it. I enjoyed your article - very much.

Mr. Kamiya might have a partial point here about the increasing incivility of letters posted, if SALON ITSELF did not put on the HOMEPAGE in plain sight a list of all the articles that are getting a substantial letters response, and how many letters each of these articles have generated.

Being only human, I can't help but immediately jump to check out an article that has garnered an unusually large number of letters -- obviously something is going on, sort of like rubbernecking at a traffic accident.

Certainly there are trolls on Salon, but seriously it's the same 6-8 people over and over again. Although a Salon reader may only know the troll as "Brightstar65" or "Parson Jim" or "BenDover" (to name the three major troll players), they have to sign each letter with their actual e-mail account. It would be relatively easy for an editor here to contact each of these people personally and ask them to grow up or stop posting, and perhaps in extreme situations, block them.

There is an inherent problem here that I think we all recognize, even Mr. Kamiya -- once you decide to block one idiot (even a really genuinely trollish idiot), you get tempted to block another....then another...then pretty much anyone who disagrees with you, or who makes Ms. Traister and the Broadsheeters cry, or anyone who against something that the bulk of Salon staff is in favor of. And then it's not a public forum anymore, it's a bunch of candy-coated asskissing.

I think we all know we read and post to Salon's letter forum because it IS so open that it is relatively immune from candy-coated asskissing. I for one would like to see it stay that way, even if it means reading past Brightstar65's particularly unsympathetic bouts with male menopause.

Another thing I think this article misses is that some of the most "sensitive"writers who can't stand being criticized are actually very bad writers. I particuarly refer to Ayelet Waldman. I was one of the posters who continually called for her removal from Salon, and was elated last year to find she had disappeared (whether the editors finally sighed and removed her, or if she left on her own due to "hurt feelings") She was not a thoughtful and intelligent writer who was being maligned by a bunch of trolls, but a genuinely ungifted writer who was only being published because of her Pulitzer Prize winning spouse, and who evidenced on Salon signs of mental instability and even pedophilia (i.e., french kissing her 7 year old son) that would get most people in this world grilled by Children's Protective Services.

OMG, like there's these people who respond to stuff posted on the web! And it totally gets published like, instantly, and then there are these folks, they're like "trolls" and they ruin it for everyone by getting all aggro and being total assholes-sometimes they even make people cry because they are total losers with no lives who want to ruin someone's day.

What year is this? 1994? Oh wait...

Woooweee, this goldurn newfangled intarwebs is sure exciting! Can't wait for the article on the new coffee places springing up all over...what are they called Starbucks or something? Yeah! Write an article on that!

That was your snark for the day, but damn, you deserve it. This has been going on forever already. Was it really worth an article?

Perhaps Salon should consider a visual re-design of the letters page (in addition to any of the editorial changes that are planned). The problem is that years of experience have programmed us to give more weight to the written word. I worry that people walk away from Salon and have a hazy memory of which part of the site they saw something on. (Was it an article? Was it a reader letter?) There's such a huge difference between vetted articles and unedited letters, and I'd like to see a clearer demarcation. I'm glad that Web has given readers the chance to talk back to their favorite publications, but so much of what I see on the Salon letters page is truly hateful and inaccurate vitriol being spewed at (women) writers. I'm not so much worried about the feelings of the writers as I am about the loss of civility in society as well as the promulgation of the notion that it's OK to lie on public forums as long as one has the anonymity of an internet nickname to protect oneself. Perhaps a different background color (or some such design element) might encourage other readers to take the letters as they ought to be taken--with a grain of salt.

The letters section of Salon is indeed a kind of strange, teenage monster. I can't wait to see how it will grow up.

The only modification I would really like to see is an automatic spell check. Mine doesn't work in letters mode, and my pithiness is always undone by after-posting mistakes. Danm.