stevenberlinjohnson.com: OIP and the news ecosystem

Today's an exciting day at outside.in: we're rolling out the beta release of Outside.in for Publishers, a suite of tools for organizing and curating hyperlocal news pages for US cities and towns. There's a great post from our CEO Mark Josephson here explaining the service and the vision behind it. A few months ago I gave a talk at SXSW talking about the ways in which the news business was moving towards an ecosystem model.

OIP is our bid to help make that ecosystem healthier and more diverse: by giving consumers easier access to far more content about their communities; by giving publishers a more cost-efficient means of creating local content optimized for local advertisers; and by promoting the neighborhood bloggers that are inventing a whole new model of hyperlocal reporting.

Since we started rolling out these neighborhood pages for media partners six months ago, outside.in's audience has skyrocketed from 1 million monthly uniques to nearly 5 million. The launch of Outside.in for Publishers should accelerate that growth. And of course, this is only the beginning: we have a great list of new features in the pipeline for publishers, bloggers, and even local advertisers.

The Basics

I'm a father of three boys, husband of one wife, and author of seven books, and co-founder of three web sites. We spend most of the year in Marin County, California though I'm on the road a lot giving talks. (You can see the full story here.) Personal correspondence should go to sbeej at earthlink dot net. Media requests should go to Matthew.Venzon at us.penguingroup dot com. If you're interested in having me speak at an event, drop a line to Wesley Neff at the Leigh Bureau (WesN at Leighbureau dot com.)

My Books

Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation
An exploration of environments that lead to breakthrough innovation, in science, technology, business, and the arts. I conceived it as the closing book in a trilogy on innovative thinking, after Ghost Map and Invention. But in a way, it completes an investigation that runs through all the books. Sold more copies in hardcover than anything else I've written.
The Invention of Air
The story of the British radical chemist Joseph Priestley, who ended up having a Zelig-like role in the American Revolution. My version of a founding fathers book, and a reminder that most of the Enlightenment was driven by open source ideals.
The Ghost Map
The latest: the story of a terrifying outbreak of cholera in 1854 London 1854 that ended up changing the world. An idea book wrapped around a page-turner. I like to think of it as a sequel to Emergence if Emergence had been a disease thriller. You can see a trailer for the book here.
Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter
The title says it all. This one sparked a slightly insane international conversation about the state of pop culture -- and particularly games. There were more than a few dissenters, but the response was more positive than I had expected. And it got me on The Daily Show, which made it all worthwhile.
Mind Wide Open : Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life
My first best-seller, and the only book I've written in which I appear as a recurring character, subjecting myself to a battery of humiliating brain scans. The last chapter on Freud and the neuroscientific model of the mind is one of my personal favorites.
Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software
The story of bottom-up intelligence, from slime mold to Slashdot. Probably the most critically well-received all my books, and the one that has influenced the most eclectic mix of fields: political campaigns, web business models, urban planning, the war on terror.
Interface Culture : How New Technology Transforms the Way We Create and Communicate
My first. The book I wrote instead of finishing my dissertation. Still in print almost a decade later, and still relevant, I think. But I haven't read it in a while, so who knows what's in there!

Comments

I'm interested in (and personally invested in) the idea of the hyperlocal in general (new urbanism, slow food, etc) and hyperlocal media in particular. As a blogger and aspiring voice (indeed, aren't we all) I can almost literally feel the opportunity.

But I'm wondering about this statement from Mark Josephson's post:

"At the same time there is an explosion of content at the hyperlocal level. There are great individual efforts like Chicagotalks.org, Buffalo Watch, All Things Richmond, Ashvegas, A is For Atlanta and C-Ville Blog. These sites need more traffic and more revenue."

Yeah. Word. (As I think the kids used to say way back in the 20th Century.) This sort of content is everywhere -- and in fact, good versions of it do exist. I'm somebody who'd like to put myself in that latter category (though not all of my content is hyperlocal, it's migrating in that direction).

I guess my question is why do hyperlocal sites struggle for traffic now? Aggregators like outside.in are intended to help weed out the white noise, I know, but I wonder if people are really willing to pay for hyperlocal content primarily for the sake of its hyperlocality. I'm pretty sure you guys are onto something with this concept, and you've no doubt got white papers and spreadsheets that say they will.

Still, to use a tired truism: content is king. I think it's not what but how. Not just that there IS content, but what kind of content is it. Voice is really, really important. Especially with the hyperlocal. What people want is to identify with a persona (or, in some cases, to react against a persona they don't identify with). The attraction of hyperlocal lies there. There's a built in bond, with place as a connector. But if the words aren't compelling in form -- i.e., they don't create a specific voice/persona that people are drawn to -- it's not going to catch on.

The analogy is to a slow food eatery that only uses local ingredients. That's all well and good, but it still has to taste good.

I guess what I'm saying is that much of the hyperlocal content I encounter is bland. Outside.in or no, that's a fundamental concern that publishers -- large, small, hyperlocal or otherwise -- will always have to contend with.

Rule #1: Make it interesting. Everything flows from that source.

Posted by: TJ Beitelman | June 26, 2009 at 11:28 AM

Posted by: cheap maplestory mesos | July 01, 2009 at 12:21 AM

Interessante e pode complicar a vida de algumas pessoas.Uma coisa é alguém que conhece e trabalha com ética e outra é a falta de ética.A transparência é importante,mas não podemos perder os valores sociais.

Posted by: Lilian | July 02, 2009 at 06:13 PM

I love this post!!

Posted by: 恒温恒湿 | July 02, 2009 at 07:14 PM

Well said...it all depends on the interest

Posted by: celebrity | July 12, 2009 at 05:17 AM

good post some times come in the business environment to increasing and development is very tough so much more things depend on the will power.

Posted by: Online free movies | July 18, 2009 at 07:16 AM

i liked the post which is very meaningful for its really sense.
thanks

Posted by: Horse bettings | July 31, 2009 at 01:36 PM

hi! i would like to link exchange with you
if intersted - let me know

Posted by: Tolum | September 10, 2009 at 02:50 AM

Congratulations on a really nice blog site