DISQUS

C · 2 years ago

I don't htink I saw an ad when I visited the site. What is the monetization strategy?

TPeters · 2 years ago

Pretty much every click and you're off-site. Even IF the sites manage to gain traction in their local markets, there really isn't any inventory to sell. If I were the dominant local media in the communities they serve, I'd send them a nice bottle of bubbly. If Outside.in succeeds all they will manage to do is drive more users to the sites they reference = more inventory for THOSE sites. Next....?

C · 2 years ago

yeah seriously, this website does nothing that I probably couldn't do with my Netvibes account.

Miguel · 2 years ago

These cookie-cutter sites that scrape content do nothing for me. There's nothing there, except some random blog headlines, that evokes a feeling of community. Bleh.

Derek Scruggs · 2 years ago

I suspect their ultimate monetization strategy will be to re-syndicate this content to local newspapers. Scripps is already having some success licensing their YourHub.com technology. It wouldn't surprise me to see them buy/partner with Outside.in

TPeters · 2 years ago

Wait... re-syndicate content to whom? The vast majority of the legitimate content being produced already belongs to local newspapers and TV stations. You're saying they will buy it back from Outside.in??? Local portals like these will not happen until the major media players in a given market decide to make it happen. They have the content, they have the online distribution and they have the sales forces.

cg · 2 years ago

I don't see an entrenched local newspaper wanting to buy most of the crap on Outside.in anyway. When I went to my city, there was absolutely nothing of value there. Too many of these VC people think that just because a site has good "local" content in Silicon Valley, that it's a great national product. Nothing could be further from reality.

Cindy · 2 years ago

Why ePodunk is so much better than outside.in:
1) Lists OVER 46,000 communities (not 63 cities)
2) Lets users blog and review communities on the local blog section.. so if you don't have a blog of your own, you can still weigh in on local issues.
3) ePodunk ACTUALLY DOES THEIR OWN RESEARCH. Trust me, I've emailed them. ouside.in provides literally no content of their own. At ePodunk you can read about a town's history, quirks, see what movies are filmed there, find out which famous residents have lived there etc. etc..

Outside.in is reguritating local news. That's it. I can't believe they claim to promote online "community" and "neighbors" since if you are from a small town, you're even not on outside.in's radar. So, if you living in one of their selected communities.. you can read the news. Not quite exciting. End of story.


So if you say ePodunk "gets closer" to being a site that nails the online community idea.. maybe you haven't visited in a while!

Duncan Gough · 2 years ago

It's an interesting problem, building a community takes real skill and fragmenting your audience into location sensitive groups makes the job even harder. I setup ecolocal (www.ecolocal.com) with much the same premise, and soon found that local news and events are so few and far between that it's hard to gain any serious traction. As our site has grown it's less of an issue, but there are bigger sites our there that offer location based content who still struggle to keep hold of their community.

As much as local news online is going to take off eventually, and maybe even replace traditional local newspapers, it's going to take old-fashioned methods to do it. If you want to build a local community online, then you need to get out into the health clubs, coffee shops and newsagents to talk to people, hand out flyers and get that word of mouth. Start in the areas you know and build up from there.

If anyone knows the phrase 'internology', you'll know just what I mean :)

http://www.goodold.se/blog/trend/2006/09/21/new...

Ed Kohler · 2 years ago

Pretty much every click and you’re off-site. Even IF the sites manage to gain traction in their local markets, there really isn’t any inventory to sell.

Yeah, sounds like the same problem Google has. :-)

Richard Ault · 2 years ago

Metroblogging, 53 cities, 16 countries, 650+ people contributing to the sites. It's also been around for over 2 years. Perfect model, not yet, but getting closer every day.

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tercüme · 2 years ago

These cookie-cutter sites that scrape content do nothing for me. There’s nothing there, except some random blog headlines, that evokes a feeling of community. :)

Martin · 2 years ago

I suspect their ultimate monetization strategy will be to re-syndicate this content to local newspapers.

shawfactor · 2 years ago

I think the approach taken by localHero is far superior: http://localhero.biz/

übersetzungen · 1 year ago

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