Each March, complaints are put on hold when members of the Organization of News Ombudsmen gather to ponder what readers really want.

Year after year, they come up with the same answer: Plenty.

Ombudsmen say readers want newsprint that won't dirty their hands, funnier comics, better crossword puzzles and accurate television listings. Says Pat Riley of the Orange County Register: "If anything happens with the comics and the crossword puzzle, you should go on vacation."

Readers also value fairness. "One bad headline can cost us several subscriptions -- even if it only runs in early editions," says John Sweeney of the Wilmington News Journal. After the Delaware daily printed the headline "Clinton Walks Away a Winner" following the last presidential debate, the calls poured in from readers of the early edition, even though the headline had been changed in all the editions that followed.

Even in photographs, balance is key, as Joann Byrd discovered a few months after joining the Washington Post last year. Reader outcry led to her thoughtful column on whether the Post had deliberately used mostly flattering photos of Bill Clinton and less than complimentary shots of Ross Perot and George Bush (she concluded there was some basis for the complaint). Other ombudsmen say they heard similar gripes during the campaign.

Readers also have special needs, ombudsmen say. In the wake of Hurricane Andrew, for example, the residents of northern Florida needed a dose of good news. So when those living in Jacksonville opened their Florida Times-Union and found not a word about the previous evening's Miss America pageant -- even though a Jacksonville woman had won the crown -- the newspaper was deluged with angry calls. Ombudsman Mike Clark patiently explained that because the contest stretched past midnight, there was little chance of getting the story in most editions, but he says few readers were pacified with that explanation. They expected better.

Readers especially don't like misspelled names, particularly in clippables such as obits; the mislabeling of anything ("There's always somebody out there who knows that's not a B-2 bomber, that's a B-1," says John Brown of the Edmonton Journal); or bad taste, especially in photos.

That last one can be tricky. Consider the Halloween photo that led to the Sacramento Bee's first-ever front page apology last year.

"It was just a feature photo of two little girls in costume," says ombudsman Art Nauman. The photo, however, depicted a black girl in what resembled a maid's outfit putting lipstick on a white girl in a frilly party dress, recalling for many readers antebellum roles. What the hundreds of readers who complained couldn't see was that the black girl was actually dressed as a dancer. Her top hat was on the floor, out of camera range. "That photo probably elicited more negative comments than just about anything I've ever seen," Nauman says.

And hold those bloody accident photos. And those shots of protesters in Baltimore who marched nude to protest fur sales. "Hypocrites," one reader told the Baltimore Sun's Ernie Imhoff. "They're wearing shoes and boots made of animal hide.... Besides, I just had a bypass operation and can't get too excited."

Also, no "broken heart" photos of people who have just heard that a family member was killed. And no funeral coverage. And enough with the "don't try this at home" photos. At the Hartford Courant, Henry McNulty says every shot that appears of two children sharing a bike elicits charges that the paper is setting a bad example.

While we're at it, how about more good news? John Brown has heard that request often and says that in response, the paper recently began a "good deeds" column. "People say, `You never write about our service groups and clubs, but if the treasurer runs off with the funds, you'll be all over it,' " he says. "Of course, they're right."

This column appeared in the March 1993 edition of The American Journalism Review