Doing Local Right

Slide 1: Doing Local Right The Lawrence Journal-World Simon Willison - http://simonwillison.net/ 8th June, @media 2007

Slide 2: “Local”

Slide 5: Local Search Sucks

Slide 6: • How do I know if the results are comprehensive? • How do I know if the locations are accurate? • How do I know if the place has closed down?

Slide 7: What the hell does a Californian multinational know about my town?

Slide 8: Local flavour matters • In London, people care about nearest tube station • In American cities, it’s all about blocks and intersections • In Oxford, it’s all about where I can park my bicycle

Slide 9: You can’t solve a local problem on a global scale

Slide 10: Meanwhile...

Slide 11: The decline of news

Slide 12: • Craigslist is destroying classified advertising revenue • Business models that rely on owning the only printing press in town are no longer relevant • News is becoming a commodity

Slide 14: • What’s the point of republishing wire stories when the Web has hyperlinks?

Slide 15: Old media blames new media

Slide 16: \"If all of the newspapers in America did not allow Google to steal their content, how profitable would Google be? Not very.\" - Sam Zell, Chicago Tribune owner

Slide 17: Two problems • Good local sites need local knowledge • Newspapers are finding their old business models no longer work

Slide 18: What happens when you put a great web team together and get them to build sites for a local newspaper...

Slide 19: ... in Kansas?

Slide 20: ... Lawrence, Kansas

Slide 21: Lawrence, Kansas • Population: 80,098 • Newspaper: The Lawrence Journal-World • Circulation ~ 10,000 • Locally owned • Media monopoly (for about 50 miles²)

Slide 22: lawrence.com

Slide 37: ljworld.com

Slide 47: ljworld.com/marketplace

Slide 61: How do you do it? • Small, passionate team • “Wouldn’t it be cool if...” • Someone else to think about the money • Intern power! • Treat your data with respect

Slide 62: Use Django

Slide 63: The team

Slide 64: The team

Slide 65: http://www.jeffcroft.com/ http://www.b-list.org/ http://www.jacobian.org/ http://postneo.com/ http://www.playgroundblues.com/ http://mintchaos.com/

Slide 66: Thank you!

Slide 67: kthxbye http://xkcd.com/c262.html