Careful readers have noticed a change in the way we handle some of our letters to the editor.

Earlier this year, we began supplementing the letters that appear in print with a small number of additional letters that are published only online. A typical Voice of the People column in the newspaper has four or five letters from readers, and we’ve been adding one or two letters online that don’t appear in print.

We have been getting more letters than ever – more than we can publish. Space in the ink-and-paper opinion section is limited, but the internet is vast.

There are times, such as around elections or following a major news event, when we will publish extra letters in space that is usually occupied by opinion columns. But even then, we’ve found that we were routinely deleting perfectly good letters that had grown outdated.

We have not changed our standards, and online-only letters are not inferior to the ones that appear in print. They are often the second or third letter to come in on a topic, and make a point similar to what’s already been said. We think readers would find them interesting, but we don’t want to crowd out other letters on different topics.

Since the online-only publication of a letter is an alternative to not publishing it at all, we don’t expect too much protest. But we know that some readers prefer to hold a newspaper in their hands, and that’s where they want their letter to appear. This is a compromise we hope will give readers more opportunity to engage with us and each other.