Here are some interesting facts and figures about letters to the editor in the Arizona Daily Sun.

In the 29 days before the new 250-word limit on letters was first announced (Nov. 5, 2004), 152 letters were published. In the 29 days after the announcement, only 92 letters were published. So much for the argument that shorter letters would allow more letters to be published. Of course, the period before Nov. 5 corresponded to the period before the election, when there were many more letters than usual being submitted. 

If you go back one year, and look at the period from Nov. 5, 2003 to Dec. 3, 2003, (29 days), you will see that 80 letters were published in that period. So you could argue that the new shorter-letter policy may have allowed 12 more letters to be published during a period of about a month. But you could also argue that the Sun could easily make room for more letters without shortening them, as it did in the period before the election. The 12 extra letters published after the election may be more a reflection of the flurry of post-election letters than of the effect of the new shorter-letters policy.

Between mid-June and mid-December 2004 (7 months): 

Nearly 700 letters were published in the Sun.

About 500 different people had their letters published during this period.

At least 87 people or roughly 17 percent of letters writers had more than one letter published. About the same percentage of letter writers appear to be NAU students or faculty members.

These 87 people had about 259 letters published. In other words, about 37 percent of the letters published were from 17 percent of the letter writers. 

The following individuals had the most letters published during the period:

Dan Cady (8)

Matthew Holmes (8)

Bob Bowser (7) 

Dana Prom Smith (6)

John Powers (6)

Robert B. Caldwell (6)

Tom Linda (6)

Deb Linda (5)

Dan Frazier (5)

Steven Yulish (5)

Steven Weishaar (5)