Hyperlocal 101Part Two: Production Models & Typology

Damian Radcliffe, 1st August 2013

Twitter: @damianradcliffe Web: damianradcliffe.com

Image via: http://nikolasschiller.com/gis/3D_buildings_nadir.jpg

There is no such thing as a typical hyperlocal offer. As we saw in Part One, business models vary.

This isn’t the only variable. Sites also have different:

* Production Models* Geographic footprint

* Platform / Media Channel* Purpose and Type of Site

These slides include examples of 7 different types of hyperlocal sites. Can you help identify any more?

Production Models

Created via a range of different production models, including:

1. Professional – websites run as a full-time operation, often by journalists e.g. Ventnor Blog and InDenver Times

2. Citizen run/produced – produced by citizens, often alongside a day job e.g. PitsnPots and Duke City Fix (Albuquerque, New Mexico)

3. Hybrid – sites combining the input of trained journalists and citizen input e.g. Lichfield Blog and Lakeland Local (Florida)

4. Aggregator/Automated – owners typically do not write any content.e.g. Planet Balham or Windy Citizen (Chicago)

Different strokes for different folks

Town / City Visit Horsham: http://www.visithorsham.co.uk/ Blog Preston: http://blogpreston.co.uk/ Pegasus News: http://www.pegasusnews.com/ (Dallas-Fort Worth)

Village Parwich.org: http://parwich.org/ Bournville: http://bournvillevillage.com/

Postcode / Ward SE1: http://www.london-se1.co.uk/ HU17: http://www.hu17.net/ Greater Jackson Ward: http://www.gjwn.net/news/ (Richmond, VA)

Defined community

e.g. estate, area, or niche geographic community of interest

Weir Estate, Lambeth: http://www.wera.org.uk/ Clapham: http://www.loveclapham.com/ Leith: http://www.greenerleith.org/ Irish Philadelphia: http://irishphiladelphia.com/ Capitol Fax: http://capitolfax.com/ (News for Illinois political insiders)

Many different types of site

Launched in 2008 offering “Local Television for Monmouthshire”,

Features a weekly 15 minute news bulletin as well as a range of other content such as local Sport, Music, Festivals and human interest stories.

Typically gets 1,000 users a day, increasing by 300% at busy times e.g. Festivals. December 2009, it recorded its millionth visitor. Now at over 2m.

Run (voluntarily) by two professional filmmakers, and 40-50 volunteers - some doing 15 hours p/w to help with filming, editing and scheduling.

A lot of the content is generated by students who did a City & Guilds Level 3 Diploma at the station; with coursework being showcased in the “Mon TV Academy” .

Now branching out in to franchise model.

Local Video:

Local Audio:

• The Hackney Podcast won Sony Radio Gold 2010 for the best internet radio programme.

• Recently won the Gold award for General programming in the New York Festivals International Radio Awards.

Launched 2008; available to download for free each month from their website.

The winning podcast looked at water and how it fits into the lives of people in Hackney. Featured author and psycho-geographer Iain Sinclair and architectural historian Simon Inglis, and music from electro-acoustic composers incl. Francisco Lopez and Stefano Tedesco.

“The Hackney Podcast is just the type of targeted and locally orientated content that sets podcasting apart from conventional radio broadcasting. Using first rate contributors the podcast examined how water fits into the lives of people in Hackney. The production quality is outstanding giving the whole

listen a water like lyricism that carries the listen through to it's conclusion.”Sony Radio Judges, 2010

• 10,000 copies distributed face-to-face in the first week of every month at markets, train stations, and events and also in cafes, shop, businesses and libraries.

• Estimated readership: 30,000. Plus online audience: http://www.hackneycitizen.co.uk/

• Written by the community incl. freelancers from NCTJ, Telegraph and the Guardian.• No office, no staff, no overheads. • No previous experience. (Keith Magnum who runs it used to work for the Green Party.)

• Sell ads, ABC1 skew. • Won’t take ads from chains competing with local business e.g. Morrisons.

• Uses free Guardian API to pull in relevant content produced elsewhere e.g. a visit from Jude Law to the Petchey Academy in Dalston.

Local Print & Web:

Local Commercial ‘Postcode’: SE1

London SE1 Community Website - local news service and discussion forum for London's South Bank, Bankside, Bermondsey and Waterloo areas. http://www.London-SE1.co.uk

Supported byin SE1 monthly printed what's on guide.

SE1 Direct weekly email newsletter7,200+ subscribers.

SE16.com is our online events guide for Rotherhithe and Bermondsey.

All produced by Bankside Press, a small family-run web and print publishing business in SE1.

Local Online Forums

Examples include:

http://www.urban75.com/

Brixton (and plenty of non-Brixton)

related content from gig reviews to

photographs and local forums. Traffic “in excess of quarter of a million page impressions

per day” despite being non-commercial and free of advertising. Launched in 1995.

• Launched July 2007. Using white label social networking tools e.g. Ning, Flickr. • Sign up required. 2,000 members. Discussion and interaction with both a civic and social

purpose within the neighbourhood of Harringay in the Borough of Haringey.

www.harringayonline.com

Cemex: $multi-billion Mexican multi-national concrete company. Very noisy plant in KX. Resident led campaign uses videos to evidence noise. YouTube links sent to UK CEO, Council etc. Cemex capitulate – correct problems and restructure plant.

Local Environmental Campaigning

Stories about life in Spitalfields, East London. Focus on human interest stories and history.

Email sign up for daily updates. Ambition to author 10,000 posts.

“At the rate of one a day, this will take approximately twenty-seven years and four months. Who knows what kind of life we shall be living in 2037 when I write my ten thousandth post?”

Readers from Qatar, Seattle and all over the world, not just E1! Sample user comments:

“Your blog has become a daily joy I look forward to savouring. It’s a bit like a grown-up (and sometimes not-so grown-up) advent calendar. I open it with the same anticipation…”

“I love you gentle author. I read Spitalfields Life when my heart is worn. It makes me think of you and how remarkable the beauty. 2037 indeed. Hope I’m here.”

http://spitalfieldslife.com/

Local Storytelling

Complex Typology

Not surprisingly, given the range of ways in which hyperlocal media is produced and distributed, there are also a wide range of types of hyperlocal media both in terms of scope and in production models.

Read more:• http://www.rjionline.org/news/micheles-list-promising-local-news-sites • http://networkedneighbourhoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Online-Nhood-Networks-Typology-rev-1.pdf

Networked Neighbourhoods, London typology Reynolds Journalism Institute, USA typology

1. Civil Social Networks 1. New Traditionals 2. Local Discussion Sites 2. Community 3. Placeblogs 3. Micro Local 4. Local Blogazines 4. Niche 5. Public Social Spaces 5. Mini Sites 6. Local Action Groups Online 6. Local News Systems 7. Local Digital News (Commercial 7. Aggregators 8. Multiples & Listings (Commercial)

This list isn’t exhaustive. If you have other examples, please add

them in the comments or send me a tweet!

About the Author: @damianradcliffeDamian Radcliffe is a Doctoral Student and an Honorary Research Fellow at Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies.

He has written about hyperlocal media for a number of organisations and media outlets including: Ofcom, the BBC College of Journalism, Networked Neighbourhoods, journalism.co.uk and the Democratic Society.

In 2012 NESTA published his landscape report - “Here and Now” – the first comprehensive review of the UK’s hyperlocal scene.

Links to Damian’s extensive hyperlocal writing and research can be found via his personal website: www.damianradcliffe.com/hyperlocal