Posts FromJanuary, 2007

30
Jan 07

Orlando, FL – First Neighbor-Nominated City

Posted by john in General / News — View Comments

outside.in/orlando launched earlier this week, the first city to be added to outside.in as a result of submissions by neighbors there. Any city that gets four or more blog submissions from users immediately jumps to the front of the line for addition to the site, and is added to our map of cities asap. Orlando got seven submissions, putting it well over the mark.

It’s great to see the user contributions to outside.in starting to really take off. That’s the whole point, after all, why we started the site in the first place. Nice to see it working!

23
Jan 07

Using Feedburner Flares to Geo-Tag Posts

Posted by steven in Development & Features / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

One of the things we’ve been wrestling with from the very beginning at outside.in is how to get contributions from blogs or media outlets that only occasionally write about local issues. We’re already automatically indexing content from full-time placebloggers — people who write consistently about their communities — but it’s a trickier issue for bloggers like me who write about their neighborhood (or other neighborhoods) once every ten posts or so. We want to be able to capture those posts, without having to capture the other nine posts that aren’t relevant to a location. From the beginning, we’ve had tools that let people suggest specific stories to outside.in using our suggest story tool and bookmarklet, but today we’ve just rolled out a very cool alternative: a Feedburner “geotag this post” flare. You can see it working here on my blog already. If a post hasn’t been geo-tagged yet, you’ll see a little invitation to “geo-tag this post.” Once the post has been tagged though, the flare identifies the zip code and gives you a preview of how many posts we have for that zip code at outside.in. And then you can click on the link and go straight to a neighborhood overview page for that zip. (See my Rushkoff post for an example.)
If you’re already using Feedburner, it’s trivial to add the outside.in flare to your blog. Fred Wilson has a good overview of how you add flare generally, as well as this post that explains why he’s excited about the outside.in version.

17
Jan 07

Neighbor Liaison

Posted by chrysanthe in General — View Comments

I want to introduce myself to all the outside.in neighbors. I’ll be updating you with occasional e-mail newsletters and frequent blog posts to let you know what is new and exciting on the site. Also, I’m here to respond to your questions, comments and concerns from the smallest detail to larger usability issues on the site. I want to hear from you to make your interaction with our site the best possible. What do you want to see in your outside.in neighborhood? I am here for your experience on the site. Be in touch! E-mail or IM to Chrysanthe@outside.in.

8
Jan 07

Neighborhood Hit-and-Run

Posted by Hillary in General — View Comments

Peter Wohlsen, one of our outside.in staffers, was the victim of a hit-and-run late last night in Park Slope at the intersection of 5th Ave and 2nd Street. He is being treated at a Brooklyn hospital for a concussion and serious injuries to his shoulder and leg. He is in a lot of pain, but we are thankful to report that he’s alert and surrounded by family. No word on any progress made towards finding the driver (who fled in a gray car that is missing the driver’s side-view mirror). Please contact the police if you have any information about this incident. The accident is a shock to all of us here at outside.in and serves as a reminder that safety is a community concern.

We’re pulling for you, Pete!

8
Jan 07

Sidebar

Posted by steven in Development & Features / General — View Comments

Some of you might have noticed that we replaced the right-hand sidebar — which would default to local events — with a general list of site-wide features and navigation elements, encouraging people to register, submit stories, etc. We’re tweaking the format slightly, but in a matter of days you’ll still be able to see events in the main column if you select that option from the pull-down menu.

3
Jan 07

politics

Posted by steven in General — View Comments

One of the things we’ve always hoped outside.in would be useful for is local politics: widening the discussion over local issues, making it easier for people to organize and share information, alerting folks about rallies and campaign stops, etc. So it was great to see outside.in show up on a very helpful overview authored by the wonderful writer Micah L. Sifry: “seven ways to find local political blogs.” The peg of sorts for Michah’s piece is the launch a few days ago of Placeblogger, a fantastic directory of hyperlocal bloggers all around the country. Check it out as well…

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