Category Archives: Peer Reviews
Most Trusted Source? The Envelope Please…
Greg Sterling summarizes recent studies that ask about the most trust source of information…
Front Porch Forum deals with lots of word-of-mouth. I differentiate between word-of-mouth from anonymous strangers (most review sites) and word-of-mouth from a clearly identified person with whom you have a connection. With FPF, the recommendations come from clearly identified nearby neighbors.
And from the eMarketer Newsletter…
CitySquares lands $1M; Version 2.0 imminent
Peter Krasilovsky reports about CitySquares‘ latest developments…
neighborhood-centric directory of local businesses has got about $1 million in venture funding; almost 400 advertisers paying roughly $600 a year, mostly for “deluxe” business profiles; and an 88 percent renewal rate.
They seem to be getting some traction, and they’re going places…
In mid-October, CitySquares is going to re-launch using new neighborhood slicing-and-dicing capabilities from Urban Mapping and Localeze, all based on an open-source Drupal platform. The site is also confidently planning to expand beyond Boston, with another northeast city set for Q2 2008, and a third one for Q3.
Co-Founder Ben Saren says the site’s re-do reflects a key truism: hyperlocal is about neighborhoods, but the reality is that neighborhoods are often “in-between” other neighborhoods. The new version of the site is going to present searchers with the five closest neighborhoods, as well as proximity options. “They can be five miles or ten blocks,” he says. That’s the Localeze part of it.
They’ll also identify neighborhoods within neighborhoods, such as Observatory Hill, which is a section of Cambridge. That’s the Urban Mapping part of it. The ability to sell across neighborhoods will help sell ads for the many small businesses “in between.”
American Machine – Must See
Front Porch Forum is about people connecting with their neighbors and getting involved in their neighborhoods. That involvement ranges from organizing a blow-out block party, to watering the next door neighbor’s plants when she’s away, to just becoming aware of a spate of bicycle thefts on the street. All that tuning in adds up to a heightened sense of community within the neighborhood… a simple and powerful thing.
Which brings me to American Machine, the new play created by local artist Jim Lantz. Jim has done a rare thing… he’s written, produced, and directed this show on his own… with a great team of people around him, but not housed within some larger organization. He’s taken the creative, career AND financial risks.
In doing this, he’s offering all folks local to the Burlington area a chance to tune in and get involved in local arts and national political discourse.
It’s simple, if you want to live in a place that has this kind of creative economy coursing through it, then you need to turn out, buy tickets, and take in the play. The show is clearly an artistic success. Now it’s up to local residents to make it a financial success by filling the seats. Get tickets here (show runs through Oct. 7, 2007).
To the play… my wife and I attended tonight’s performance with friends. While Front Porch Forum is a sponsor of the play and American Machine advertised in FPF, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I thought it might be lean toward a heavy-handed political piece… not at all.
Simply, I was enthralled. The production grabbed my attention and kept it the whole show. The six characters, their stories and their relationships all rang true, even when the drama flared. I know I’ll be thinking of the characters for some time, wondering what comes next for them. And the political message struck me as timeless, not about policy minutia.
I look forward to discussing the play with neighbors out on the sidewalk in the coming days… lots to mull over.
One last idea for locals… post a message about American Machine on your FPF neighborhood forum… help spread the word and build local community! Here are some details.
Martha Tormey: Is you a girl?
Martha is funny. I still laugh thinking of some of the bits in her first show. She just posted this on her neighborhood’s Front Porch Forum and I see it spreading to other neighborhood forums.
Hey! I am very excited and proud to announce that my second solo standup comedy show will premier on Saturday, October 6th at Waterfront Theatre [Burlington, VT]. It’ll be a great night – Mike Robideau (winner of last year’s Comedy Battle) will open. Tickets are available through the Flynn at 86-flynn or online at http://www.flynntix.org. Hope you can make it.
Grayboxx searching for “sweet spot”
Following up on our previous posting about Grayboxx, here’s the headline from Peter K. at The Local Onliner today… Grayboxx CEO: OK, Burlington Probably ‘Too Small’
I’m glad to hear a reasonable explanation for the funky results seen by people who live in Burlington. I hope Greyboxx does well elsewhere and improves in Burlington.
Peter appears to have stolen Montpelier’s crown as Vermont’s capital and bestowed it upon Burlington. 😉
And while Grayboxx says it should work better in areas with more than 100,000 people, that doesn’t quite jibe either, since greater Burlington has about 130,000 (the City proper is 38,000).
Smalltown.com goes deep and local
I think I visited Smalltown.com a year ago and thought it looked interesting. Well, it seems they’ve been busy! They now host sites in five California communities…
Smalltown is the website where you can discover local treasures from the best source: your neighbors. Find a great babysitter, carpenter or stylist. Read reviews of the high school play. Watch a video clip about a new restaurant.
Smalltown recieved $3M of Series A investment about a year ago. But what caught my attention was co-founder Hal Rucker’s recent blog posting…
Which makes more sense for local: generate deep and uniquely useful content in a small geography, then replicate that process for hundreds of towns, or launch the whole US with shallow content all at once? (Choose one, because you can’t launch with deep local content everywhere at the same time.) InsiderPages went wide and shallow and it didn’t work out. Backfence tried to go deep in several regions at the same time and it, too, couldn’t get enough traction. Smalltown is going very deep in a very small geography, with plans to replicate that success quickly when we have all the technology and marketing knobs dialed in.
This gets at my previous postings about authentic local sites vs. global giants masquerading as local sites. As the number of web offerings explode, quality of information and genuine local knowledge will become more and more valuable. Sites that tap into that will become gems among the countless “wide and shallow” offerings.
I can foresee each city in the country having its own authentically local site (or sites) in the next few years that clearly dominate their town’s online space. Just like when every city had 1, 2, 3 or more daily newspapers. Just like in the past when you wanted news, sports, weather, debate, advertising, coupons, classifieds, etc… most people reached for the Gazette or Sentinel or whatever dominated the local newspaper scene.
Some sites will be homegrown entrepreneurial efforts (e.g., iBrattleboro), others may be a morphed newspaper that gets online done right, some areas will be covered by a “chain” like Smalltown or Backfence (RIP), and other poor towns will only have soulless cookie cutter sites supplied top-down by a giant dot.com.
So Smalltown appears to be doing the hard work of developing truly local sites based on their proprietary platform and process. I’m impressed with the concept. I’m not familiar with their initial communities, so it’s hard to assess the results to date, and I haven’t focused on the technology they’ve developed. More power to ’em. 🙂
American Machine – The Play
Jim Lantz, of Burlington’s South End, had a hit last year with his original play The Bus. Now he and his crew are hard at work preparing for the opening of his new play, American Machine (FlynnSpace in Burlington, VT, September 25 – October 7, 2007)…
Part parable on the American dream, part cautionary tale taken from the headlines, American Machine tells the story of a great factory that once made parts for classic American cars.
This local original production will rely heavily on word of mouth and any member of Front Porch Forum has an opportunity to help spread the word. First, write a short post on your own neighborhood forum announcing the play. Then, after you see it, post a brief review. While American Machine is advertising on Front Porch Forum, any posting from a neighbor will likely carry more weight with readers. Here’s how Jim put it…
One of Burlington’s great gems is Front Porch Forum, an on-line neighborhood forum created by Michael Wood-Lewis. If you live in Chittenden County, chances are you live in one of the 130 forums that neighbors use for all sorts of communication – finding a lost cat, recommending a plumber, to… letting people know about a new play!
One way you can help our production (and the Burlington Schools Food Project) is to place a free notice on your local FPF telling neighbors about our play and the opening night benefit for the Burlington Schools Food Project. Be sure to include our web address: www.AmericanMachineThePlay.com
Not a member of your neighborhood Front Porch Forum? Go to FrontPorchForum.com, take a tour, and join. … It’s free!
I’m looking forward to it! Get your tickets today.
About Blog
Ghost of Midnight is an online journal about fostering community within neighborhoods, with a special focus on Front Porch Forum (FPF). My wife, Valerie, and I founded FPF in 2006... read more
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