1. Our core strength is still hands-on testing and evaluation of products by writers with real-world IT experience (i.e., your peers); and

2. We sometimes take ourselves too seriously -- it's time to lighten up a little (as one staff writer put it, "Even geeks have a sense of humor, no matter how weird it is").

We also polled our readers to get a reality check on what coverage areas and issues are most critical. Here's what you told us:

• Most of you play a major role in deciding which products and technologies will solve your organization's business problems (translation: Keep those reviews coming); but

• Many of you are still required to implement projects ill-conceived by nontechnical management (translation: Tell us how to plead our case with the top brass); and

• Politics is the worst part of your job, followed by low pay, poor management and insufficient training (translation: Give us answers to our career questions).

Based on that feedback, we agreed to keep pounding away at products in our labs but to weave even more business content -- vendor data and business justification analysis, for instance -- into our existing sections and specials. We also created two new departments: Career Coach, a Dear Abby-style careers Q&A for IT professionals, and Last Mile, a collection of entertaining infobits contributed by readers and staff members. Our complete reader poll analysis will appear in the next issue, so don't miss it.

We decided to add some new elements to our ever-popular Centerfold, too: "The Hard Sell" tells you how the IT folks at the organization we're profiling got buy-in from the business office, and "15 Minutes" gives you a glimpse into the work lives of the people involved in the project at hand. You'll get your first taste of these goodies in our October 10 issue too.

But Wait, There's More

We decided to expand our column mix, rotating writers and topics to ensure coverage of all core information technologies. We persuaded lab director Ron Anderson to write a column about the trials, tribulations and triumphs of life in the Network Computing labs -- read "Lab Tested: Of Servers, Switches & Ping Pong." We also cajoled business editor David Joachim into writing a column on the business challenges IT managers face, like having to plead with upper management for technology investments that don't lend themselves to hard-core ROI analyses. And we invited contributor Don MacVittie, applied technologist at WPS Resources, to write about life in the application-development trenches.

We upgraded the Report Cards that run with every comparative review, too, adding components like "How We Graded" to give you more insight into our product ratings and evaluations (see the Report Card on business-intelligence software for an example).

Aside from all that, it's business as usual here at Network Computing. We'll continue to produce the best possible content and present it in the best possible package every two weeks, come rain or come shine. Special thanks to designers Bob Powers and Peter Casella and the rest of the staff for helping us bring David's creative vision to life. Send me e-mail with your questions and suggestions.