Ghost of Midnight

… about neighbors, community and Front Porch Forum

GetVendors.com gets in too late?

Posted on Thursday, August 16, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

The Local Onliner reports today about GetVendors.com today…

Service referral sites like ServiceMagic and Angie’s List have gotten some traction. But by no means are they dominating the business. What will it take?

Ashish Mohole, co-founder of startup GetVendors.com, thinks the key is to guarantee that users get a wide assortment of choices when they make a query. Too many queries come up empty, or return just one or two possibilities, he says…

“Our approach is simple, honest and yet, effective and scalable,” says Mohole.

But most interesting to me was Mohole’s revealing assessment of the field circa mid-2007…

But Mohole also notes that the company’s prospects remain uncertain… Mohole openly wonders whether the time has passed whether startups like his can make a go of it. “All the big guns are pursuing everything possible to get in the local market,” he says. “The local space it is not easy for a start up to get traction in a short period of time without exposing to the risk of big players catching up.

In fact, he and his two other co-founders are contemplating selling the company. “A few years back, the experimentation would have been good idea with start ups making progress under the radar. But now it is more than likely these ideas will get ‘picked up’ and won’t have a chance to build premium value.”

Off-Forum Responses Add Up

Posted on Thursday, August 16, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

Front Porch Forum has yet to examine in detail the “multiplier effect” of a single posting on one of its neighborhood forums. That is, it’s plain to see that many postings result in following up messages on the forum. But it seems a majority get results that happen off-forum via email, phone calls, or even – gasp – on someone’s actual front porch.

Here’s one example from Pam on the Huntington Neighborhood Forum today…

Hi all – thanks to everyone who gave me seamstress ideas!

I am going to have Lisa B. help me but wanted to list the recommendations I received if anyone else is looking:
Lisa B. 434-xxxx
Eliza W. 434-xxxx
Lynn F. – Richmond
Linda in Burlington across from BOVE’s

I appreciate all the personal emails I received with ideas. Remember though, if you respond via the Forum, everyone benefits from your ideas. If you suddenly need a seamstress in the future, log onto http://frontporchforum.com and search the archives.

So she appears to have gotten at least four responses off-forum and one on-forum. I know our family has gotten many off-forum responses for various postings… up to a dozen or more. All from nearby neighbors.

P.S. And I agree with Pam that FPF members should, if it makes sense in the moment, post their response to the whole neighborhood forum. Not only is the information then immediately available and stored away in the searchable archive, but it also contributes to the forward momentum of the conversation… members SEE that it works and use the forum more when they see lots of results.

Thanks Pam!

Yahoo! Local invests in redesign

Posted on Wednesday, August 15, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

As noted by Mike Boland and Peter Krasilovsky today, Yahoo! Local just rolled out its first redesign in two years with a focus on user-generated content. I know this is a big deal and involves huge sums of money, advertisers and visitors… but I’ve never had anyone tell me that they use this service… an arbitrary measure, but one that’s hard for me to shake. Peter K. compares it to an Oldsmobile… and I guess I’ve never had anyone crow about their Oldsmobile to me either… solid, always there.

Does GM still make Oldsmobiles?

UPDATE:  Some more reviews of Yahoo! Local’s changes.  First, eNeighbors does a good job sussing out Yahoo’s potential to get neighbors providing content to each other.  Here’s someone echoing what we’ve been finding with Front Porch Forum.

And Greg Sterling weighs in… interesting comments to his post.

“Next Big Internet Thing?”

Posted on Monday, August 13, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

Pramit Singh ponders “the next big internet thing” today from New Delhi…

After the blogging, user-generated content, Citizen Journalism, Youtube, Del.icio.us, Digg, I am tempted to believe that nothing new, exciting and useful has come on to the scene and that this is a phase of consolidation and rejiggling of business models….

While Backfence failed to bring Citizen Journalism to every town USA, others like Front Porch Forum, iBrattleboro, Topix.com, New Assignment and Assignment Zero (which is now over) took CitiJ to new levels.The Knight 21st Century News Challenge promises to support better news innovations and we will be better for them.

It’s amazing to see FPF’s humble efforts begin to register on “what’s next on the web” postings.

Moose in South End

Posted on Sunday, August 12, 2007 by • 1 comment

Celia reported on Aug. 10, 2007 in The Addition Neighborhood Forum…

This morning, about 9 a.m., we were visited by a huge, graceful, gangly moose! — which clomped through the backyards, delighted the kids, and pretty much freaked out the pets. Last seen heading toward Flynn Avenue, tailed by animal control and the police (it seems the moose ditched those tailing it, though, at least for a while). My dog tells me she’s never, NEVER going in our backyard again.

That’s in Burlington’s South End… not exactly regular moose country. Wow.

Parting’s sweet sorrow

Posted on Thursday, August 9, 2007 by • 2 comments

One of the great pleasures of moderating Front Porch Forum has been getting to know so many more local folks than I knew previously.  Deb is a case in point.  She’s been a great booster and user of the service… invited me to address her Rotary Club, flyered door-to-door in her own neighborhood, posted compelling messages, and more. Regrettably for us and good for her, she’s moving away to be close to kids and grandkids.  I was touched by her farewell today…

I have just returned from my soon-to-be new home [out of state].  Almost more than missing my friends and the amenities here in Burlington, I will miss the connection I feel to Front Porch Forum.  When I think of moving to a brand new community and the difficulty of learning about my new neighborhood, I think of all the advantages that the Forum brings.

Is there any realistic way I can encourage my new community to begin a similar service?

I hope FPF can catch up with Deb in her new community in the coming months!

Essex Reporter tells FPF story

Posted on Thursday, August 9, 2007 by • 1 comment

Joyce Carroll wrote a wonderful article about how neighborhoods are using Front Porch Forum for this week’s Essex Reporter.

When Henry, a six-toed marmalade tabby cat with a penchant for adventure, wandered off last Halloween, his owner did not have to resort to posting flyers around the neighborhood. Instead, Sue McCormack turned to her neighbors via the Front Porch Forum.

McCormack, a member of the Maple Street Forum, is one of hundreds of Essex and Essex Junction residents who take advantage of this service. The forum aims to recapture the days when advice was traded over backyard fences, and recipes were shared during visits to the neighbor’s front porch.

Julie Miller-Johnson, who spearheaded the Countryside Front Porch Forum, said 132 members, about half of the neighborhood, have joined the service. Their forum is active, she said, with postings coming through every couple of days.

In some cases, the forum has become a way to reach out to those in need. Miller-Johnson recalled a fire in the neighborhood this past winter. Neighbors, she said, were actively communicating about ways in which to help the family.

“We’re not a front porch society anymore,” she said, adding, “The forum changed the way this neighborhood feels. People talk to each other.”

NY Times asks about social networking

Posted on Thursday, August 9, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

The New York Times website today asks readers about what online social networking services they use and how. I see one Front Porch Forum mention in the comments already… thanks Julie!

Next Generation Social Networking… FPF?

Posted on Wednesday, August 8, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

Thanks to Julia Lerman for her posting yesterday on her DevLife blog (focused on the .NET developer world). Julie’s known worldwide in the .NET circles and just so happens to live in Front Porch Forum’s pilot area. A great surprise for us. She writes…

I have more than enough people to keep up with and stepped way back on my blog reading about a year ago when I realized I was losing touch with my personal friends because of my many new virtual friends.

However, there is a new social networking tool that was actually created right here in Burlington Vermont, that I joined over two months ago and I just love it! It’s called FrontPorchForum. I’ve referred to it as Facebook for grownups. But it’s really not anything like that…

It is an amazing way of connecting with your community and helping each other out… I also feel that I’ve suddenly become so much more connected to this community that I moved into almost 4 years ago. I know who lives in those houses, the name of the local blacksmith and that there are so many really interesting people living a stone’s throw away.

It is an interesting phenomenon to me because in the past six or seven years, the internet and blogging has made me part of a worldwide community of software developers… But FrontPorchForum has come full circle because it has used this same technology to bring me back into my own local community which, although initial connections are through the web, enables me to walk out my door and down my road and meet up with many new friends and neighbors.

I’ve already talked to [the FPF founder] about what he’s going to do when it goes nationwide or even worldwide; what technologies he’s vested in currently and what is on his mind for scaling out. Because as far as I’m concerned, that is inevitable!

Which led to this posting from Johan in Sweden…

The number of social networks on the net has exploded… It’s too many networks and ways for communication. So what will the future bring us?… I think smaller networks with a base in your community could be the next thing. I think many users are fed up with the giant communities. I found this post from Julia Lerman that talk about an existing network that has a good idea. She writes “I realized I was losing touch with my personal friends because of my many new virtual friends”. I can recornize this. She talks about Front Porch Forum. Julia describes the network like this “What FrontPorchForum focuses on is your very local community. It creates an online forum, also distributed every few days in an email, that allows you to connect to your neighbors. So the people in my town of Huntington are the only people who’s posts I read and who see my posts (and my email address)”.

National Night Out Award for FPF

Posted on Wednesday, August 8, 2007 by • Comments are off for this post

South Burlington’s National Night Out celebration seemed a great hit today. I know our kids had a great time. And it was a real honor to accept the event’s community award on behalf of thousands of local folks who are using Front Porch Forum to build community within their own neighborhoods. (See here and here for past postings about this event and award.)

And here are a couple photos of us (Michael and Valerie) accepting the award from Vermont Governor Jim Douglas (top) and Police Chief Trevor Whipple and Sgt. Tom Fraga.

Thanks to all these folks for the recognition!

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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