EveryBlock, the hyperlocal news and community discussion site that abruptly closed last week, may be resurrected if NBC can find a suitable buyer.
NBC News Chief Digital Officer Vivian Schiller told me Monday that the network is continuing to … Read more
The impact of Everyblock goes far beyond the traffic to the site itself. Everyblock is one of those ideas that bent the world in a new way when it came around. One of those ideas that felt both so obvious and so ingenious simultaneously, that it looked *easy* when it was anything but. Back when it launched in 2008, the idea of arcane civic data being of use to regular citizens didn’t really exist. The idea of geolocation-based information gathering didn’t really exist. The idea of (shudder) “hyperlocal” information at the street-level didn’t really exist. And yet today, five years later, these ideas are commonplace thanks in large part to Everyblock proving that they were possible and vital.(more...)
NBC News has shut down EveryBlock, one of the early pioneers of data-driven hyperlocal community news and information.
The decision took effect today. Vivian Schiller, senior vice president and chief digital officer of NBC News, told me today by … Read more
There was no single event, person or experience that swayed my decision -- just a gradual realization that I've done what I wanted to do with EveryBlock and am hungry for the next thing. I've really enjoyed building the site, collaborating with talented people and breaking ground in several areas, from open data to mapping to local news -- but I've realized lately that I don't have the passion for it that I once did.Msnbc.com bought EveryBlock in 2009; unlike most acquisitions, Holovaty writes, this one has worked.
Msnbc.com has been a fantastic company to work for. With EveryBlock, it's managed to do something very rare: not only keeping it alive post-acquisition (which the acquired company cannot take for granted), but achieving the delicate balance of providing guidance/resources and keeping their hands off.(more...)
In my role, I feel as though I'm coming into a fantastic situation where we have an absolutely incredible product, and I will layer in additional business and marketing strategy and overall leadership to help accelerate the growth of the site.
Just look at the two sites, and the difference will smack you in the face.At Westword.com, AOL Ventures president Jon Brod discusses Patch and other AOL properties.Patch is essentially like a local newspaper website - it is heavily oriented around staff-produced articles and “static” content like business directories. It’s trying to do a lot of different things, much of it not necessarily very well.
EveryBlock is much, much more focused. You tell us which places you’re interested in following (your block, your work neighborhood, whatever), and we give you a simple timeline of what’s happened in those areas recently
Patch has been unbelievable. We're now in over 800 communities and over nineteen states. It's really about digitizing towns and communities. We built it from the ground up for the express purpose of a community news/information program.We hired over 1,000 people last year, including over 800 journalists. You're going to start to see us integrating the blogging platform of Huffington Post and commenting platform into Patch, so you'll start to see more blogging, more aggregation, in addition to the professional journalism that is very much Patch's main stay.
> Patch is looking to sign up 8,000 bloggers, reports Jeff Bercovici
[This update corrects the spelling of Adrian Holovaty's name.]
