What happens when you mix a newspaper with talk radio? The results can be found more and more on our Web site.

We started allowing readers to add their comments to our stories almost a year ago. That made plenty of people inside the TNT a bit nervous. For decades newspapers have thrived as primarily a one-way flow of information: we report, you read. That was more of a lecture but now, with the internet, it’s easy to foster a conversation by opening up a Web site and giving readers the power to add their own take.

It’s not only easy – it’s becoming expected.

At a young readers forum here last year, that was a major reason several attendees gave for preferring to get their news online rather than from the printed paper: the ability to interact with the news and read what other readers thought about the story. This concept has helped blogs become so popular and many readers refer to the comments section of our web site as a “blog.” Even though it’s technically incorrect, they’re on to something. In one small way, we’ve started converting our newspaper web site into a giant collection of blogs. (Shhh, don’t tell anyone around here.)

In contrast to the newspaper’s original “interactive” space – letters to the editor – we don’t double check and verify the identity of everyone who posts to the comments on our site. It’s a different type of content and I think readers know the difference. A letter to the editor is more credible than a comment posted online, at least when it comes to knowing who’s doing the writing. But comments are valuable because they allow people to post ideas with some sense of anonymity that otherwise would prevent them from throwing their two cents into the mix. Then other readers take those ideas for what they’re worth as ideas, not as a message from someone because of who that person is.

Of course, there are a few pitfalls. There is comment spam where people try to use the tool for commercial purposes. There are comment vandals who try to agitate other people just for fun. There are flamers who can’t seem to trade ideas without avoiding personal attacks. And there are foul-mouthed jerks who think it’s fun to see how long all bad words they post will be left on the site.

So we try our best to moderate the comments and keep the discussions on topic and at least PG. The system sends an email to me and a couple other folks on our team every time someone places a comment. Some days are worse than others, but I can honestly say that we have only had to remove a fraction of the comments that have been posted.