Is Locial the Next Wave?

Local + Social = Locial? There are probably better words, but it's a concept that's important. Bob Tedeschi's report in the New York Times today highlighted LifeAt, MeetTheNeighbors.org and i-Neighbors.org. They are all sites that use the social networking sites to connect us to ..... people next door, down the block or in the area. It's an easy idea to understand, and one that makes a lot of sense.

It gets rid of an artificial divide, showing in fact that online connections can actually support physical proximity. Yes, you can have 237 "friends" on MySpace, but you can also be connected -- mini-casting neighborhood concerns, throwing block parties, sharing tips on contractors and day care providers -- with those close to you, but who you've never met or have only nodded to in passing.

The truth is we often know little about our neighbors these days. So the ability to share information, news and skills -- on our own terms -- makes a lot of sense. LifeAt concentrates on apartment buildings, while i-Neighbors is a sociologist's experiment in connecting people. While sensible, the business model is of course still developing; fees from apartment owners and the like. It's another area in which local media should have an interest. Connected to the power of local news and information and local calendars, this is the hyper-est local.

Certainly, experiments from Backfence to MyHub to Pluck's various initiatives have given it a try. One maxim among them has been the need to be both local and to have critical mass, which meant "communities" of 60,000-100,000 people. Maybe that'll work in some cases, or maybe, it's just a slice of who we are. Maybe in local-local, it doesn't take (just) a critical mass, it takes a neighborhood.

Overall, it seems the web is forcing us to come to grips anew with basic questions of identity. It doesn't take a social psychologist to tell us that identity is quite a complicated thing. It's part who we are, where we came from, what we like to do, what we work at, who we hang out with and who we connect to. That's no algorithm yet invented that can deal with all those intricacies, in proportion, by time of day, week and place. Maybe that's why we're all still fumbling around with these wonderful new tools that offer the promise of connectedness, but deliver so many disconnects along the way.

And, as these fledgling sites show, just maybe the death of distance doesn't have to stop us from being neighborly.

Comments

[Shannon]

Interesting post. I work for a new radio station called vocalo.org. It airs at 89.5 in Nortwest Indiana, and is coming to Chicago. Users can make pieces about their communities, themselves, etc. and upload them to the site. We then play them on the real life airwaves. Users can also make social networks around the stories they are making.

WBEZ started the station with the idea of making Chicago Public Radio more local and more connected to the net. At first these ideas seem antithetical. But it seems more and more like they don't have to be. I really love the idea of using the web to form REAL world connections, and to make REAL world events/projects happen. I think Vocalo has the chance of making it happen in the media realm. Are their projects out there(besides just social networking) that do this?

[Kelley]

Thank you for your thoughts on LifeAt. One question - would you personally use a social network to meet your neighbors?

[jackd]

Geography as a component of community is certainly overrated.