Washingtonpost.com Opinions section boasts new features

By giving more power to readers and editorial personalities, the redesigned Opinions section at the washingtonpost.com will become more functional and interactive, according to Hal Straus, Opinions Editor for Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, the subsidiary of the Washington Post Co. that publishes its online content.

"We think the feature highlights some of the Post’s most interesting thinkers and personalities," Straus said of the site's Opinion section.

The Opinions section will also offer Web-only content, he added.

"The Post newspaper provides an incredibly deep and smart opinion report. The Web-only content supplements that with some different voices and with work that responds to the Internet’s continuous news cycle and is more focused on Internet information sources," Straus said.

Straus said he and his colleagues hope the changes will not only promote discussion about issues and ideas but will also enliven the site and its appeal to viewers.

"There’s an enormous audience for people who want to interpret what’s going on around them and who really enjoy the give and take of debate on political and cultural issues," Straus said.

"We think our new design and features make the opinions area a more useful and provocative place for the readers to visit," he added.

New features in the redesign include Emily Messner's The Debate, which hosts a variety of opinions revolving around one controversial issue and Reporting for Duty, which publishes comments from a washingtonpost.com staff member who has been deployed to Iraq. And to complement the lengthy articles, the Toles v. Toles section will showcase published cartoons alongside Web-only sketches from cartoonist Tom Toles.