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Got a question, comment, criticism or compliment about globeandmail.com?

Unlike the traditional branches of the media, the Web offers a tremendous forum for real dialogue between readers and the journalists who gather, edit and distribute news and commentary.

We at globeandmail.com are strongly committed to the widest possible conversations with our readers through live discussions, "comment on this article", blogs and other features.

We've greatly expanded all of these over the past few months — not without a few bumps along the way.

While many of you have taken the time to tell us that you like these formats for two-way dialogue, others have questioned the policies associated with them or made suggestions for alternative approaches.

We'd like to continue that dialogue.

That's why Angus Frame, editor of globeandmail.com, was on-line earlier today to take your questions on any topic related to the website of The Globe and Mail newspaper.

Mr. Frame has been with The Globe and Mail since 1996 in various capacities in the news and Report on Business sections. He moved to globeandmail.com in 2000 as Deputy Editor in charge of business coverage and became the site's editor on Sept.10, 2001.

He has an honours BA in Political Science from McMaster University and a Journalism degree from Ryerson University. He lives in Toronto's High Park neighbourhood with his wife, two daughters and dog.

Editor's Note: globeandmail.com editors will read and allow or reject each question/comment. Comments/questions may be edited for length or clarity. HTML is not allowed. We will not publish questions/comments that include personal attacks on Globe journalists or other participants in these discussions, that make false or unsubstantiated allegations, that purport to quote people or reports where the purported quote or fact cannot be easily verified, or questions/comments that include vulgar language or libellous statements. Preference will be given to readers who submit questions/comments using their full name and home town, rather than a pseudonym.

Jim Sheppard, Executive Editor, globeandmail.com: Welcome, Angus, and thanks for joining us today to take questions from our readers. I wonder if we can start today by asking you to describe some of the latest features we've added to the site and — knowing you can't give away corporate secrets — talk a bit about what you see happening on globeandmail.com in the coming months?

Angus Frame, editor, globeandmail.com: Hi, Jim, and hello to everybody. Thanks for joining us.

It has been a busy time here — a lot of new features to talk about.

At the beginning of October, just in time for the start of the NHL season, we re-launched and dramatically expanded the Sports section of the site. globesports.com now includes a deep menu of features to keep the hockey fan satisfied, here are some of my favourites:

Our regular Top 10 galleries, the latest showcases the top receivers in the NFL and can be found here

The globe on hockey blog where our writers opine, debate and specualte about the latest from the greatest game on ice.

Our enriched stats package where you can get up-to-the-minute scoring on the games in progress as well as detailed stats for your favourite players and teams.

I should also point out the improved Real Estate site , which will be of particular interest to readers in the Toronto region interested in exploring the trends in the market. And for everyone, we have brought celebrity contractor Mike Holmes on board to answer reader questions (I am confident Mike's chat will draw more readers than yours truly but I'm not complaining…). His latest chat is here

Over on the Business desk, we rolled out the fifth installment of Board Games a few weeks back, a nice look at corporate governance in the country with some interesting on-line bells and whistles, you'll find all the stories, charts and more here .

And today we launched the 2006 technology Gift Guide . If anyone is wondering what kind of television a humble on-line editor covets , here is some suggested reading.

Our University Report Card, the handy tool for anyone heading off to the halls of higher education, can be found here

I could go on talking about what's new but the second barrell of the question asked for a bit of a hint about what's to come . . .

Well, on Saturday, we are going to invite everybody to join our on-line dinner party. I am sure you will enjoy yourselves.

In the new year, you can expect more and better — more dialogue enhancements to make our readers part of the conversation that is news in the 21st century; more special reports on the issues that matter to Canadians; a better site for people using a Blackberry to read our news and, well, I have probably said too much already . . .

S.G.: Hi, Angus. Just a note to let you know that I was a critical when The Globe switched from the old website [in February] just because I wasn't used to the new style. But now I love the new site. I apologize for the nasty note I left on the feedback blog the night you went live. On the new site, I love the ability to comment and to read the comments of others, the logical groupings of content, and the fact that I get 100 free archived articles with my subscription. I like all the photos (day in photos, week in photos, red carpet photos and joke photo where people submit a caption). I find that the e-mail alerts come at an appropriate frequency, too.

One bug: Is it possible to fix the Style Section so you can see who is the author of the article? Currently, only the headline of the article appears. I have to guess from the headlines which one is written by Leah McLaren. Thanks so much, Angus. The website rocks!

Angus Frame: Hi, S.G: I am glad the redesigned site has grown on you. There were a lot of people critical of the change when we rolled it out on Feb. 4. But since then, many have really warmed up to it. You are not alone in enjoying our photo galleries, they are one of our most popular features and something we are doing a lot these days, on the Home Page and also over on Sports.

As for Style, we are falling short in that section right now. The weekend newspaper has a stunning Style section and we really do not do justice to it on the site, but this is something we are going to fix in the coming months. You will get a rough idea of how we want to treat Style this weekend with the Dinner Party special that will be on globeandmail.com first thing Saturday morning.

As for Leah McLaren, you may want to track her using this page , which features only her stories.

Ranald Oulton, Toronto: Heresy though this might be, I think globeandmail.com is a more important forum for discussion about Canadian issues than blogs. Blogs tend to be heavily partisan, attracting mostly "hear, hear" comments from even more deeply partisan people, all patting each other on the back. This may lead to a breakdown of discourse and sober second thought, as people read only what they want to hear. I think you're doing a better job at providing a more balanced forum — witness the number of posters daily who are outraged that you allowed other people's viewpoints through (grin).

Angus Frame: Hi, Ranald. We try. The comments on articles and on-line discussions like this one are designed to help create a national conversation that gives an equal opportunity to all to express their opinions, add their insights and generally share ideas about the stories that are shaping the country.

It is not always easy. Sometimes the conversation gets pretty rough around the edges and often the on-line editors are strained to moderate the often overwhelming volume of comments on stories that touch a chord.

On busy days, we are unable to post all worthy comments, which is understandably upsetting to people who have in good faith contributed to the conversation.

We do have a few tricks up our sleeve to make the comments better, so please keep an eye on it in the coming months.

And I am glad to hear you find the contributions fairly balanced. I regularly field complaints from all sides of the political spectrum complaining that we are filtering out either left-leaning or right-leaning comments. I suppose if both sides are a bit upset we might be doing something right . . .

R. Carriere, Maritimes: Mr. Frame, thank you for taking questions today. While I thoroughly enjoy most of The Globe's columnists, I feel the G&M is not doing its work concerning politics and the burning issues of the day (Afghanistan, global warming.) Concerning politics, the G&M only quotes politicians and hardly ever challenges these same people. Running the MacKay "dog" story for more than a week was almost tabloid journalism! Instead of that, why can't the G&M sit down with these same people and ask the ugly questions that are on the mind of several intelligent Canadians. As an example concerning Afghanistan, all we ever hear is useless rhetoric from generals or non-truths from politicians. To get the real picture of what is transpiring there, one must search out other sources of media.

I believe you can do so much better. Or are you somewhat muzzled by your owners to tow a certain line a la Fox News?

Angus Frame: Mr. Carriere, thanks for joining. I am sure any avid reader of our comments section is familiar with your thoughts on a wide range of topics and may even recall the exchange you had with Jeffery Simpson on this same subject earlier this week.

Personally, I felt the Peter MacKay story merited coverage for a number of reasons: It shed some light on the nature of the discourse inside the House of Commons and provided an opportunity to discuss what should be considered acceptable behaviour by our elected representatives. As well, the reaction of all the parties involved helped Canadians better understand the character of some of our most prominent elected officials. And this made it interesting to a large number of people who followed, commented upon and thought about the story. I am going to guess that you read more than one story about the alleged doggie remark.

And since we are using canine references, I can assure you we are not muzzled by our owners who believe in a free press and let The Globe play in a true leash-free zone of journalism.

Phil Primeau, Toronto: Mr. Frame, my question is in regards to the relative level of bias when it comes to allowing or disallowing reader posts on this site.

I have witnessed on a number of occasions comments allowed from the left-leaning readers that have said very inflammatory or extreme things . . . I have seen many examples of extreme anti-Conservative policy statements from readers . . .

At the same time, I have made right-wing statements that have been far less extreme such as "the problem with Canada is Canadians are cheap and want everything for free" or "the problem with Canadians is that they have a inferiority/superiority complex," and I have found those to be completely censored. Why is that?

If you are going to post reader commentary, should it not be rated by the same set of principles? I am as Canadian as it gets, and my views — while not necessarily the opinion of the Liberal majority — are there to challenge and provoke thought.

Based on what I have experienced, I find that your Web editors will censor anything with too much right-wing flavour . . . yet print extreme socialist rantings that threaten harm or other irrational sentiments. Why is that? What is the agenda or mandate you have been given?

Angus Frame: Hi, Phil. Allow me to quote myself from an earlier answer: "I regularly field complaints from all sides of the political spectrum complaining that we are filtering out either left-leaning or right-leaning comments. I suppose if both sides are a bit upset we might be doing something right . . …"

I suspect that there have been occassions where your comments failed to make the site simply because we did not get an opportunity to read them. This is a problem that we are addressing. Simply put, the comment function is so popular that moderating and posting every valid remark is almost impossible, we are a victim of our own success in a way and we are making changes to help keep the conversation open to all as much as possible. In terms of mandate, we simply want to spur an effective national discourse that is balanced, informative and maybe even entertaining.

Jim Sheppard: Mr. Primeau, if I may jump in here. I've personally vetoed several of your postings over the past few weeks — not because we are biased [which we are not] but rather because you have violated our guidelines in several areas, including making personal attacks on Globe journalists, making statements that cannot be quickly verified [as you did in your question above to Mr. Frame where I deleted certain references you cited which I could not quickly validate about other readers of globeandmail.com], and trying to direct readers with almost every posting to a blog that consists mostly of attacks on The Globe and its journalists. If you think I or we have been unfair, please don't hesitate to e-mail me directly .

Just to be sure you and our other readers are clear, let me repeat the guidelines we use when decided whether to approve or reject a submitted comment:

Editor's Note: globeandmail.com editors will read and allow or reject each question/comment. Comments/questions may be edited for length or clarity. HTML is not allowed. We will not publish questions/comments that include personal attacks on Globe journalists or other participants in these discussions, that make false or unsubstantiated allegations, that purport to quote people or reports where the purported quote or fact cannot be easily verified, or questions/comments that include vulgar language or libellous statements. Preference will be given to readers who submit questions/comments using their full name and home town, rather than a pseudonym.

Sarah Matthews: Who selects the photos that accompany articles or OpEd pieces? Yesterday's photo of the U.S. ambassador to Canada was very dark except for a narrow slice of his face. That was the worst photo of him I've ever seen, and it was striking because of the extreme dark and light contrast. Anybody who is visually oriented understands the impact of the photos selected. Be aware your paper is under my microscope now. Big Sister is watching.

Angus Frame: Hi, Sarah. It is good to have Big Sister watching, I like the traffic on the site and we are certainly accountable to our readers for the decisions we make.

The photos on the OpEd pieces are selected by one of the online editors, often it is Jim Sheppard, who is moderating this discussion and can jump in at will. On other pages, the photos are selected by the editors on duty. The pictures in our daily photo gallery are selected by the photo department of The Globe and Mail.

We do understand the importance of photos and are very conscious of the impression that can be created by careless photo selection.

Jim Sheppard: Sarah, I didn't actually see the photo to which you are referring. If you post a comment here and/or e-mail me directly with the story headline, or URL, I'll take a look at it and get back to you.

Drew Morris, Toronto: I think the idea of having these "conversation forums" is a good one. However, as a news reader, I'm generally more interested in hearing reader comments that would provide more information about the story, or portray facts in a different light, so as to see the news from another direction.

More often than not, the comments pages are filled with partisan bickering, personal attacks and one-liner comments. While these can be amusing, and no doubt keep browsers on your site longer, they do little to add to my "news reading experience."

Could comments possibly be filtered into "information" and "opinion" forums? That way, people who want to know more can learn more from informed readers, but people who want to rhyme off words like "harper-crite", "neo-con", "liberal loonies", etc. can still have their venue.

Angus Frame: Hi, Drew. That's an interesting idea that I had not considered before. I have been looking for ways to allow the most relevant comments to make their way to the top of the list, possibly by allowing readers to vote on the comments they find most useful, but I had not thought about setting up categories so a comment could be identified as "opinion" or "information."

Would you want the editors to sort the comments or do you think the person submitting the comment could decide which category should be used?

Denbigh Patton, Toronto: What can be done to speed up the "conversations?" I've observed that in the hour that you have a subject "live," the page is updated two, or three times only. Sometimes there is no update for 20 minutes in that hour. Web users can lose interest in a lot less time, no? Are you guys looking at this? The idea of "conversing" is appealing, but the format makes the experience frustrating. I typed this at 2:12 p.m.

Angus Frame: I am typing this at 2:36 p.m. so we are not in bad shape right now. But there are times when the lag between postings could be frustrating for some on-line readers. We are looking into it and are developing a solution right this second. But we have to give the developers time to get the code written.

Jim Sheppard: Just to complete the loop, I forwarded your comment — along with several others — to Angus about 2:25 p.m. He sent his reply back at 2:38 p.m. but I didn't get it posted until 2:53 p.m. because I was still posting earlier questions and answers.

In other words, these discussions are interesting and informative. But they are labour-intensive to start and also require a lot of time for the guest to answer and for the host to proof-read and post.

As Angus says, we're constantly looking at ways to make it a better experience for our readers.

John R. Harris, Nakadaki, Japan: Mr. Frame, as your main page is not updated very frequently outside Eastern time business hours — i.e. when your Asian audience is awake — and on weekends, I tend to skip directly to Print Edition/Headline Index.

Unfortunately, you persist in putting this essential button "below the fold." In other words, I have to scroll down to get to it. All you have to do to please me — well, for now anyway! — is swap the In Depth and Headline Index boxes. Your curmudgeonly reader in Japan, John R. Harris.

Angus Frame: Hi, Mr. Harris. We do update the site around the clock. But often the stories that we consider the most important break during the business day in North America. So the lineup may not change as quickly at other times in the day.

But when news breaks, we are on it. I believe we were the first website in North America to post a story about the tsunami disaster that occurred in the wee hours on Dec. 26, 2004, and our overnight editor will regularly get major international stories onto the site before almost anybody else.

As for your navigational query, I have a suggestion: Try clicking on the words "print edition" that appear just below the large banner ad on the Home Page and just above the globeandmail.com banner. This will get you into the full list of print edition articles without scrolling below the fold. Hope that helps.

Jim Sheppard: Thank you, Angus, for answering questions from our readers this afternoon. Any last thoughts?

Angus Frame: Thanks all for your questions. It has been a pleasure and I will certainly be back again soon.

In the meantime, feel free to e-mail me directly if there are any more suggestions, complaints or compliments you have about the site.