David Pogue has gone through what I'm starting to go through: Traffic is growing for the blog, but the writing has to loosen up to encourage comments. (I walk a very difficult line as a manager in expressing any views about media change, I might note, so I am inherently a lot less provocative.)
His encouragement in the latest From The Desk Of blog at the New York Times is that interactivity with an audience makes them treat you less cynically --- and of course, you learn something new from them.
I've found over the years that media take the audience's loyalty and interest lightly. The more we explain our decisions, the more people at least appreciate how we took the time to weigh the options. Managers then don't have their motives hypothesized and people get to suggest how there might have been a wiser course of action.
Pogue (and, I might note, an assistant) sift through submissions to ensure there aren't harmful or profane comments. I do the same, without an assistant. But there, like here, criticism and comments are more than welcome. Just say who you are and keep it clean.
