cindy writes “This week The Los Angeles Times will launch “wikitorials,” online editorials that readers can edit.
“It may be a complete mess, but it’s going to be interesting to try,” Editorial and Opinion Page Editor Michael Kinsley told The New York Times for an article on Monday. “Wikitorials may be one of those things that within six months will be standard. It’s the ultimate in reader participation.”
Another new feature, “Thinking Out Loud,” is described as “an experiment in making up our minds in public,” according to Martinez. He writes that the feature, which will initially tackle immigration and traffic, will allow readers and Times writers to debate topical issues on the paper’s Web site and in all areas of its editorial pages. “We don’t have a solution, and there may not be a good one,” he explained in the paper. “But that is no excuse for failing to come up with the best one. We hope this process will help us do it.”
Are we really wanting consensus on an op-ed page?
Story about the LA Times editorial unheaval from The New York Times and Editor and Publisher
I would have settled for comments
I think letting readers REWRITE editorials to be an extreme measure that will likely dilute the voice of the paper, but I think they’re on the right track with greater reader participation.
In particular, I’d like to see every paper have a comments section after every article and editorial where readers could suggest corrections, link to other resources, politely point out biases.
I think the comments would need to be moderated or restricted to commenting only to the story and not to fellow readers to prevent lengthy flame wars.
I wish them luck in their experiment.