Hyperlocal Woes
The Washington Post jumped on the hyperlocal bandwagon and launched LoudounExtra.com. The idea was quite similar to one that we are tackling in this class. The Washington Post understood that they could not compete with the Internet or cable TV in covering breaking national and international news, but they could dominate what happens in their backyards. They obviously dealt with problems that we too are dealing with specifically not familiarizing themselves or engaging with the residents. The problems we are dealing with are ones that the residents do not seem to want to participate.
Another problem they faced was the fact that while the site had all the bells and whistles of a state of the art website, they lacked in actually following through in making this a viable product. Whenever a big story broke involving Loudoun County, the Post typically published it on Washingtonpost.com without a link to LoudounExtra. That deprives LoudounExtra of potential traffic. Nor did the Washington Post's own dedicated Loudoun County page send visitors directly to its online sibling.
The LoundounExtra did not consider that the market that they were potentially trying to get as readers really had nothing in common other then county government. The reality is to penetrate those communities requires a more dedicated effort than the LoudounExtra.com team was putting forth.
Tom Grubisich's analyses of the pitfalls of the LoudounExtra site are dead-on. The point of the site is to present news that the residents are asking for while not having to stifle through things that are not newsworthy. Not to mention LoudounExtra's problems begin with how it's mapped. He says "As the WSJ article points out, people don't live in "Loudoun." They live in communities within the county like Ashburn, Sterling and Broadlands - each a sum of many particulars (geographic, demographic, historical, occasionally quirky) that add up to identity as specific as a strand of DNA. Kind of like Lawrence, KS, where Curley found the inspiration to do his hyperlocal pioneering."
I agree with Grubisich's notion that to generate viewers one needs to build a site that encourages people to express, in a variety of ways, how they think and feel about their community-meaning adding more than restaurant or shopping reviews. Asking questions like what makes residents proud? What are their opinions about their schools, recreational facilities, police protection? Who do they rank as their community's first citizens? What volunteer groups do the best job? What's the No. 1 problem? Hence, engaging the community!
Claire Cain Miller's piece, "Washington Post Ends Hyperlocal News Experiment" is a pretty depressing reality. I feel like that while we may have good intentions, the response we as a group are getting from the people of Old Town, are pretty much negative. I have yet to come in contact with someone who seems remotely interested in blogging for ChicagoNow. They seem pretty set in their ways and not to keen on our help.
The article suggests that making hyperlocal sites work will continue to be a challenge, Mr. Sterling said. "It may be the case that you need to do some mix of community-based citizen journalism or blogging and maybe have a couple dedicated folks in the market," he said. With LoudounExtra.com, "it was probably the case that they were just really top-heavy and couldn't get the ad support."
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