These are the early days of digital news alternatives to the mainstream, so any report that surfaces on what seems to work (and not) is welcome. The J-Lab, underwritten by the Knight Foundation, has some early learning on hyperlocal news sites to share.

The summary isn't terribly pretty: The business model depends on grants, the most sustainable models are extensions of someone's personal commitment, and training the public to be citizen contributors is a high-churn, low-return concept.

But within its findings is a big revelation: Rather than replace conventional outlets, the hyperlocal sites are adding to the public sphere's information.

"They’ve done a bunch of other things as well: They triggered other news stories, helped solve community problems, imparted a lot of political knowledge that empowered voters, and engendered a new level of accountability for municipal leaders," a summary of the report says.


 
 
The term "hyperlocal" suggests several things: Very granular content on specific places, aggregated content that depicts a new local picture, or subject matter or content that deals with geographic organization, among them. Sarah Hartley, who runs the city blogs for The Guardian, thinks we need to reconsider the term.

She thinks it's more about an attitude than about geography. She's identified 10 features of hyperlocal:

1. The author's participation.
2. The blurring of opinion and fact.
3. The community's participation.
4. Small in scale but large in impact.
5. Medium-agnostic.
6. Obsessive.
7. Independent.
8. Link-loving.
9. Passion.
10. Frugal and economically fledgling.

Are there others? What do you think?
 
 
Inside Higher Ed offers an idea to fill some of the gap created by the loss of voice in some markets: Models based on the expertise in universities or related institutions.

The academic blogger. Campus-based ventures for local and regional news. Undergraduates serving as reporters. Land-grant approaches to funding. Tapping into the constellation of entities (galleries, museums, and the like) associated with the university.

All are put on the table as possibilities in this intriguing approach.

"If these trends continue, the public affairs that most nearly touch our everyday lives -- school board elections, library censorship battles, state bond issues, social service regulations, land development schemes -- will become veiled from public discussion,"  writes David Scobey. "Those with power will have a powerful incentive to inside dealing and corruption; those without it will have a powerful inducement to acquiescence."
 
 
The announcement this week of a deal between the Seattle Times and a batch of local neighbourhood blogs is an indication of the change under way in news.

Only a couple of years ago, a deal like this would have been unthinkable for either party --- the legacy media wouldn't have deigned to open themselves to the hyperlocal parties, and those parties would have found it suffocating to play with the Goliaths.

Mutual interests have emerged: legacy media want the granular coverage, hyperlocal media need the larger impact to generate a better business model.

The nature of the deal is lacking in financial specifics. It's all about exploring advertising opportunities, collaborating on content, exchanging links and audiences, and agreeing to examine the common opportunities.

But it's an interesting model for others to study. Seattle is one of the strongest examples of a market able to pursue such a deal, but there are others near and far.
 
 
It has been a busy week in the world of so-called hyperlocal news.

The Washington Post closed LoudonExtra.com, its major initiative into neighbourhood news. Everyblock, tne exceptional technological platform to examine what's happening on your street and in your midst, was sold to MSNBC. Huffington Post and Facebook worked through a new model of social networking that has strong local applicability. And a conference at the Aspen Institute discussed some business model proposals (largely shooting them down, which is the way critics typically work en route to acceptance).

Fast Company's Michael Gluckstadt chronicles the week that was and implies a more interesting question toward the end of his piece. He suggests hyperlocal ought not be judged as some sort of saviour of journalism, but as a model on ints own that contributes to the broader public sphere.
 
 
Fast Company delivers a sobering piece on the economic promise and delivery of hyperlocal news --- the term for information about your street, district and community at a very granular level.

It is, as Fast Company suggests, a $100-billion potential in the United States. But the consumer demand isn't being met by sites, and sites aren't meeting the demands of advertisers. The result is the absence of a business model.

What Fast Company concludes is that the idea itself is excellent. It just needs to marry its potential audience with its potential revenue, and that may be some time away.
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Adrian Holovaty's EveryBlock revolutionized the way hyperlocal news online worked. The aggregator of local data, produced for geographic regions as small as a city block, really astounded people when it arrived only a couple of years ago.

Now his code has been released as part of his original deal with the Knight Foundation and it's bound to offer opportunities galore to newsrooms with programming and developing savvy.

The key will be in determining how best to use aspects of the EveryBlock matrix. Simply regenerating EveryBlock won't work because markets each produce data differently and need their own treatment.

But it's a great step forward for the organizations that choose to roll up their sleeves --- indeed, it does a lot of the hard work for them. The overall impact could be significant for location-based journalsm.


 
 

The New York Times gets around to examining the hyperlocal journalism successes of such sites as Everyblock and Outside.in, and it largely finds the phenomenon positive and encouraging.

What it says the sites lack is depth and detail, but it notes that advertisers are excited by the possibilities of drilled-down local content --- even if, so far, they aren't voting with their wallets.

It's always important to view a Times piece as a turning point in public understanding on an issue, so this should make the hyperlocal sites far more popular and visible in a hurry.

 
 

Roy Greenslade of the Guardian carries along a presentation at the World Editors Forum from Stephen Brook on hyperlocal success in Sweden and Finland. Those markets are among the world's most innovative in digital journalism, and what they're finding is that the hyperlocal approach is doing well.
But citizen journalism is stalling or perhaps not contributing as expected.
Nicely put, the approach of hyperlocal is not only geographic but mental proximity, says Reeta Merlainen, editor in chief of the Helsingin Sanomat.
Robb Montgomery posted video of the presentation here.

 
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