to be an online trade publication and peer-to-peer community for technology professionals.

Users come here because we provide useful information to help them make good buying decisions, learn IT best practices, and understand what's happening in the tech world. That's the stuff that editors and writers are focused on every day. That's the crux of what we do.

Advertisers come to TechRepublic because we have a great community of highly-engaged users. If we ever lose that, the advertisers will walk out the door right behind them.

So the audience is always first -- this is even more the case on TechRepublic since 80% of our writers are drawn directly from the audience (as you alluded to). That doesn't mean we can do everything that everyone in the audience wants to do or wishes that TechRepublic had. But, if the site ceases to useful and usable then people won't show up, and then it's game-over. That keeps us focused on bringing our A-game every single day.