Category Archives: hyperlocal

paidContent:UK: Hyperlocal Hopes May Be Blunted By Revenue Realities In 2010

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"[If] you’re going to ask Newsquest to hear your hyperlocal partnership proposition, you better have a good proposition. The company’s digital managing director Roger Green spoke with refreshing honesty by saying he’s sick of upstart local businesses—or “zero-revenue publishers” as he calls them—looking for a free ride from the Gannett-owned publisher’s commercial mass."

New York Times: Politico’s Creators Plan Local News Web Site for Washington

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"Allbritton Communications said its new operation would start with a newsroom of about 50 people — far larger than those of other local news start-ups around the country, though still smaller than the local news staffs of major metropolitan newspapers. ... Robert L. Allbritton, who heads the family-owned company, and [Jim] Brady said they had concluded that the venture had to be done on a large scale or not done at all — essentially the same premise that accompanied the founding of Politico."

One Man and His Blog: Should Hyperlocal be Hyperniche?

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Adam Tinworth: "We keep talking about hyperlocal, and that's a thought process that's rooted in the geographic nature of most newspaper circulations, particularly in the US. What our experience in RBI is teaching us is that hyperlocal is just a subset of hyperniche - and that there are many niches calling our for good, community-focused journalism."

The EveryBlock Blog: New feature: custom locations

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"[T]he boundaries of a neighborhood don't necessarily correspond to the boundaries of the area you're interested in ... [W]e've decided to address this problem once and for all, and we're incredibly excited about our new approach. Today, we're launching a feature that puts the control of geographic boundaries in your own hands."

The Economist: Local newspapers in peril: The town without news

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"An advertising slump has hit local newspapers much harder than national papers or other media (see chart). The growing reach of national brands like Rightmove and Auto Trader means that local papers have lost their grip on property and car advertising. Most painful has been the disappearance of job ads. Public-sector recruitment has shifted mostly to official websites in the past few years, and recession has eroded the rest. In July 1999 an edition of the Echo carried 17 pages of job advertisements. The final issue had one-fifth of one page."

New York Times: Bits Blog: MSNBC.com Acquires Everyblock, a Hyperlocal News Start-up

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"Charlie Tillinghast, president of MSNBC.com ... said MSNBC.com would consider “sharing” Everyblock data with other news sites, particularly troubled newspapers. “We do not see it in our interest at all for local newspapers to be weakened. 'It’s a very difficult vacuum to fill without them,' he said."

Mike Davidson: Msnbc.com Acquires EveryBlock… Welcome Brother!

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Newsvine's Mike Davidson: "Although building technologies and services for msnbc.com has slowed our development efforts on newsvine.com a bit, for the time being, Newsvine now serves over 4 million uniques a month; almost four times the traffic we did, pre-acquisition. We’re also distributing more revenue to our great community of writers than ever before."

The EveryBlock Blog: MSNBC.com acquires EveryBlock

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"MSNBC.com has hired our whole team, and they've made it clear to us that we'll be driving the site's strategy and implementation, and that our site will remain an independent destination as a community service. ... Second, it means that we'll have resources to expand EveryBlock profoundly. MSNBC.com is the most-visited news Web site in the U.S. and is in solid financial shape in a time when news organizations around the world are struggling."