Unfortunately, we have had to remove this feature, at least temporarily, because a few readers were flooding the site with inappropriate material.

Thanks and apologies to the thousands of people who logged on in the right spirit.

...[M]anagers of the newspaper's editorial and Internet operations, which have undergone a number of changes in recent months, said they may attempt to resurrect online editorials written collectively by readers.

"As long as we can hit a high standard and have no risk of vandalism, then it is worth having a try at it again," said Rob Barrett, general manager of Los Angeles Times Interactive. ...

Although marred by some profanity by contributors, the experiment got off to a fairly high-minded start, said Michael Newman, deputy editor of the editorial page, who proposed the wikitorial idea.

Voluntarily overseeing part of the discussion was Wikipedia founder Jim Wales, who soon encouraged "forking" the editorial into two pieces -- one taking a pointed anti-war stance and the other arguing for the ongoing U.S presence in Iraq.

Sometime after midnight Saturday, Newman said, he stopped monitoring the site for the night, and later the pornographic images began to pour in. One image that was repeatedly posted is infamous on the Internet for its depiction of a man's private parts.

Barrett said he was called about 4 a.m. at home, and he ordered the feature shut down immediately.

Wikis could be brought back to the Times Web site, he said, but perhaps with a limited group of contributors or with a Times employee reviewing text changes before they could be displayed on the Web site."