When reader criticism is not helpful

Here is an e-mail I received from a reader today:

"After months of waiting for you to make constructive changes to your publication I am forced to express my opinion of the major changes that have been made to the Tribune.
"I have numerous opportunities to compare the Tribune with the Fresno Bee and the Sacramento Bee. It is hard to believe the three are all owned by the same parent company.
"I was a subscriber to the Fresno Bee for for about 35 years and have subscribed to the Tribune for 15 or 20 years.
"You have always been weak on Local, State, National and world news but since your recent major changes the paper is almost a total waste of time. News that is reported is cursory at best and when reported detail is so lacking the piece is almost all fluff ...
"Please look around and see what can be done with a paper if a professional is at the helm."

Let me emphasize that we welcome legitimate criticism of what we do and produce. But to be helpful, criticism needs to be specific. Tell us exactly what we did not do right, or how you think the paper can be made better.
To compare us to Fresno, Sacramento or any other paper in a metro market is to miss the point. As they have bigger markets to serve with more advertisers than we have here, they can produce more pages every day. That means more state, nation, world and even local news. We will never equal them in terms of volume of news.

Now, as to the reader's point that our recent changes have meant less news in The Tribune, that simply is untrue. The fact is, the recent changes we made did not significantly decrease any amount of news that we publish, save for some features material. In other words, what we cut back on was the “fluff” the reader says we have too much of. We are printing the same amount of local, state and nation/world that we always have.

As I was writing this blog, I got a phone call from a reader who asked, in upset voice, why we had not covered an event he found important. It occurred in San Francisco last Sunday and involved two gay men who, the reader said, had desecrated the inside of a Catholic church with homosexual behavior. I tried to explain that I first had to look at our wire services to see if such a news item had moved. We do not cover news outside our county firsthand because our staff is not big enough to do that. Unhappy with my response, he yelled, "Forget it. You are a ----ing village idiot."

Sheesh. Obviously, that level of discourse is not going to work.

So, readers, when you are specific in your criticism and civil too, it really helps. We can then address the problems you raise.
_ Tad Weber