Category Archives: Front Porch Forum

“Neighbor Connect” online space heating up

Posted on Thursday, October 6, 2011 by 1 comment

Congratulations to Conor White-Sullivan and the team at Localocracy… recent acquisition of Huffington Post, as reported by Kara Swisher on WSJ’s All Things D.  Arianna Huffington said “[Conor and team are] pioneers in using the web to empower citizens to improve their towns, and their unique vision and talents will enable us to deepen our users’ engagement with our sites.”

This is further evidence of the “neighbor connect” online space heating up.  In the past year, I’m aware of at least two dozen significant start-ups focused on facilitating conversation among people who live near each other.  Some, like Localocracy, aim at niches (local ballot issues and related), while others intend to promote a general sense of community.

Huffington Post/AOL joins MSNBC.com, which acquired EveryBlock.com last year, in this space, as well as many other new VC-backed and boot-strapped entrants. Most start-ups in this area appear to be strong on tech and weak on traction.  That is, they can crank out the code, but few people actually show up and use their product.  To make matters worse, many attempt to open up everywhere all at once.  As a friend said… “a mile wide and an inch deep.”

Front Porch Forum is an established leader in this space, with amazing traction in our state.  More than half of our primary city participates.  In another FPF town, 75% of members post… much higher than the 1-10% seen on many social sites.  And the member success stories flow through FPF faster than we can write them down.  People use FPF to reduce crime, find jobs, give away baby gear, reunite with lost pets, recommend roofers, debate ballot measures, call city hall on the carpet, and much more.

With our new web application recently launched, we look forward to bringing Front Porch Forum to communities far and wide.

DR Power Equipment puts FPF to good use in #VT

Posted on Saturday, September 24, 2011 by No comments yet

Found a gift in my inbox today…

As a Video Producer for DR Power Equipment, I need to find locations to highlight my company’s products. Front Porch Forum makes my job much easier and I get to meet really great folks. Thanks for your help!

I love being an FPF member. A friend recommended it to me and at first I thought, “no way, I don’t want any more emails” but it doesn’t take any time to go through the daily list.

FPF connects me to my community, makes the bond between us stronger, and personal conversations continue due to FPF postings. I look forward to reading it every night. I’m not a Facebook fan but I LOVE Front Porch Forum.

Marianne Eaton
Producer/Editor
Country Home Products

 

Sometimes it’s the little things…

Posted on Thursday, September 22, 2011 by No comments yet

Thank you to our Grand Isle neighbor for finding our keys and responding to our Front Porch Forum post! It’s been an amazing week of neighbors looking out for us. We hope to reciprocate when the opportunity arises!

Another great posting of neighbors helping neighbors.

Screeching like a trapped seagull in #BTV #VT

Posted on Wednesday, September 21, 2011 by No comments yet

I think this is a FIRST for Front Porch Forum.  Posted by an FPF member in Burlington’s Old North End today…

This morning, at about 1.30 a.m., my husband and I were ripped from coma-like sleep by a loud distress sound.  It sounded like it came from about 250 feet away, somehwere on the eastern part of Walnut, up from Dot’s Market. The sound didn’t vary much in pitch. For about 15 minutes, we lay in bed speculating about its its source.

“I think its a possum or something. Perhaps an animal in a have-a-heart trap?,” speculated my husband.

“No, I think it is a seagull.  I bet its trapped in a dumpster or garbage,” I offered.

In his boxers, my husband left the house to help the poor animal.  He was back shortly after, with the sound was still carrying through the whole neighborhood.

“Not a seagull, Val. A mammal.  A **very happy** neighbor.” To maintain the G-rated spirit of Front Porch Forum, I will proceed by referring to the sound sources as the”trapped seagull” and the “seagull rescuer,” who was clearly already on the scene before my husband and I thought to help.

Trapped seagull:  I am happy for your late hour pleasure. I know this won’t be an issue in 4 weeks when we have to sleep with our windows closed, but it would be neighborly if you didn’t broadcast your coital bliss over such a wide distance.

Seagull Rescuer:  Trapped seagull is not being honest with you.  If a seagull were trapped for that long and were forced to give out a distress call at the volume for such a long time, she would, in real life, perish of exhaustion. Only in the movies do seagulls maintain that level of pleasure at that volume for 45 minutes.

Then again, maybe the rest of us are doing it wrong and seagull and rescuer are on to something.  Perhaps we can knock on their door and ask them next time we are treated to their pleasure sounds?