The News & Observer invites you to join our Reader Advisory Panel. The purpose of the panel is to improve our news coverage and to put us in better touch with readers.

As a panel member, you’ll be part of a group of several hundred readers who we’ll contact from time to time to sample your opinions on or reactions to news coverage. Sometimes, we’ll ask you questions about news-related topics: “How has the increase in gas prices affected you?” Sometimes we’ll ask how good a job the paper is doing: “Did The N&O give adequate coverage to the tsunami disaster?” And sometimes we’ll ask about seemingly silly topics: “How do you use your Ipod?”

Be assured that the questions will be only for news-related purposes. We won’t market to you or sell your address to commercial businesses. Usually, the information will be used only for The N&O’s coverage, but sometimes we may ask you a question as part of a 30- newspaper consortium to which we belong. Recently, for instance, that group asked readers whether newspapers should have published graphic pictures from the Iraqi war.

You may respond to these questions or ignore them. Your answers may be used in stories, and sometimes a reporter may call you with follow-up questions. We promise not to bother you more than once a week, and likely the contacts will be less frequent. You may drop off the panel at any time. The only purpose is to help The N&O be a better paper, more in tune with its readers.

If you’re willing to participate, please complete and submit the form below. For further information, call Public Editor Ted Vaden at 836-5700. Thank you.

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