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Well, he said with institutional conceit, I think I'm the only person from The Carolinian who has interviewed you on that or any other topic - and I did plenty of reading beforehand and am pretty sure I asked that crucial last question. Any reporters I trained would have too.

And we don't even have a journalism program...

Nah, you weren't one of them, Joe. You did a great job. These have all been within the past three weeks.

So what's the answer to the last question?

(if you provide it here, any reporter doing his/her homework won't ever have to ask you again. :-)

John: This happens to me all the time with reporters. Also, have you noticed an alarming number of reporters who have trouble asking a question that is, grammatically speaking, in the form of a question?

Well John, since you seem up for it, here's some questions I'm curious about (I've been reading your blog all this year and observing your paper for almost two years):

Content
• What online content successes have surprised you in the last year? Where there any expected successes that didn't materialize?

• Why do you set your home page to refresh every 10 minutes? There is rarely new content every 10 minutes -- this seems like a cheap way to inflate page views.

Technology
• How much control over your back-end do you have? How much influence over your technology tools does your corporate parent exert?

• What functionality do you want to add to your site in the next year?

Organizational
• How large is your online content staff? Online sales staff?

• I noticed in your job section that you're hiring a developer. How many developers do you have currently?

• How many new online content positions do you anticipate adding in the next 12 months?

Thanks! I love that you write about what's happening at your paper, and have learned quite a bit about the power of transparency in a newsroom from you.

-Joe

(full disclosure: I work for the Winston-Salem Journal. These questions do not reflect the views of my employer)

Jay, I think that it is the television interviewing style. Watch the Today Show, or worse, one of those entertainment shows, or worst of all, a sports interview. The interviewer's first "question" is along the lines of, "That was some victory, coach."

Joe, let me get back to you later today when I have a little more time.

Anna, the answer is, "I represent a wealthy financier who is interested in your advice on a wide range of matters. He's willing to pay handsomely. Are you interested?"

Here goes:

Content:
* Online content successes: the organic growth of blogs, podcasts and online interactivity. The sense of innovation from some on our staff has been amazing to watch and nurture. No, nurture is the wrong word. Try, get out of the way of.

* Expected successes that didn't materialize: We expected fewer problems and less delay on the technical side. That has slowed us considerably from achieving our content goals.

* Page refresh: I had to ask on this one. Page refresh isn't something I get involved with. I think we did want to make sure that people got the latest content, but it may be set to refresh too often.

Technology
* Control over the back-end: Do you mean me, in news, or do you mean more generally?

* Corporate influence: Little but can you be more specific?

* Functionality: I'm no techie so I'll toss this one to Charlie or Stephen if they want to answer. However, we plan to enable comments on stories, to offer video and more audio, and to fix the search function. For starters.

Organizational:
* Online staff: We have two people in news devoted to content. However, we are using an integrated model so, obviously, many in the newsroom are contributing in a variety of ways.

* Developers: That hire would DOUBLE the number of Web developers.

* We hope to add one online content position. Again, we're using the integrated model so that the number of people solely devoted to online content is deceptive.

If I've misunderstood a question or raised additional questions, let me know.

Hi John,

I'm impressed, thanks for the time and the information. By technology control I was curious if your paper is responsible for the server / software decisions, or if that was something corporate provided for you ...

I know it's hard to find good people for online news jobs, it seems like hiring a developer is a good way to work around the large skillset online news folk usually need. The challenge I imagine is finding developers willing to work for newspaper wages.

I wish I could continue this conversation, but I don't know what to say. Hah.

-Joe

We're responsible, Joe.