Most readers of The Advertiser probably won't believe this, but we talk about you all the time.

Not each one of you personally, but you readers as a whole and what you want.

On the most basic level, we try to write headlines that draw you into the story with writing that is informative, complete, balanced and understandable. Photos should be interesting at a minimum and compelling at best. We seek to maximize our limited news space with shorter stories, informational graphics and breakout boxes of numbers and charts. We try to anticipate what questions you have about the topic we're writing about and what you most need to know.

We try to think like readers. Is the story too long and where will you stop reading? Has the subject we are writing about been mined to death? Does the story have an impact on our readers, such as whether their home values have depreciated or their taxes are going up?

Furthermore, we have to consider the timeliness of the news. If a news event happened early in the morning, we know that it has been on our Web site all day and will be covered on the TV stations that evening. Reading about it almost 24 hours later on Page One makes us look dated and useless. So we often seek analysis or a forward-looking spin that highlights upcoming developments.

On a larger scale, we do readership surveys measuring the satisfaction of every section. We also do numerous focus group studies on new or revamped sections, such as our redesigned newspaper, our TGIF section and Metromix online. And dozens of e-mails and calls come in each day expressing appreciation or dismay over what we've chosen to print.

Two areas of The Advertiser get the most attention each day. The first is what is happening on www.honoluluadvertiser.com and how often it can be updated and expanded. In the past few months, we have added more streaming video, polls, photo galleries and even a video preview of the next day's stories in print.

The second, and equally important concern, is the newspaper's front page and what it's going to look like each day. Much care and discussion goes into what appears and how it is played on the page. Local stories always take precedence over national and international news on Page One unless it's a major event, like the Iran uprising. When there's too much negative news on the front, we try to offset it with something for readers to smile about.

We don't get it right every day and great minds will differ on whether or not something is a story and why it appears where it does. Someone will always see something on their favorite Web site or television talk show and wonder why it hasn't found its way into The Advertiser.

Needless to say, we will continue to critique our product each day and make sure your interests are uppermost in our minds.