In the past, the direct relationship between readers and editors was most obviously manifested in the letters pages of print newspapers. There, readers would respond to stories they had seen; and set out their own opinions. However, those pages were (and are) comprehensively curated – with letters selected by an editor and often tweaked for style or length.
In the digital world, there is still a place for letters’ pages. The Independent is fortunate to have a strong group of regular letter writers and each day we select perhaps half a dozen to publish. Edits may be made to help with flow or sense, but we obviously have more latitude to run letters in full online.
Beyond the traditional letters platform, readers can engage in debate much more immediately on our comment boards, “below the line” on specific articles. Like many publishers, we do not pre-moderate comments and we do not direct debates. We only step in when other users flag comments as inappropriate; at that stage we make a decision about whether the comment should be restored, or indeed deleted. The majority are republished.
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