There is reason to celebrate here at Windy Citizen central today. Yesterday we had our first story receive 30 votes from our users, a clear and exciting indicator that we just might be doing something right (and that you all have impeccable taste).
The honor couldn't have fallen to a better story. The link in question leads to an investigative report about Chicago's floundering parking meter privitization effort.
It lays out in plain english and in great detail how the city failed to do due diligence as it rushed to sell off its rights to the meters for quick cash. The piece was written by Ben Joravsky and Mick Dumke of the Chicago Reader. I cannot recommend it highly enough to anyone wondering what the story is with our wonky parking meters in town.
Thanks to everyone who helped keep the story at the top of the front page for a solid 18 hours or so. You can see who voted for the piece over here.
This is also a great opportunity to make a point about how the Windy Citizen is helping Chicago media makers in a way that social news sites like Digg, Reddit and Delicious aren't, can't, and simply won't.
Digg.com is the el-supremo social news site on the web with millions of users. Nearly every Chicago blog, web magazine, and newspaper web site has "Digg it" links on their story pages, added in the hope sthat these buttons might help their stories reach Digg's hallowed front page and reap thousands of hits.
The Chicago Reader is running Digg's buttons. How did Digg handle the parking meter story?
Not so well, eh?
What about Reddit? They've got milions of users and even have a Chicago-specific channel where local stories are shared and rated. How'd the parking meter story do over there?
It doesn't even appear on the first two pages of stories on the Chicago Reddit. In fact, the story hadn't even been submitted to Reddit as of Friday afternoon when I posted it myself.
Well, what about Delicious? It's more of a bookmarking site than a social news site like the others, so surely this great story received more attention there, right?
It did better, with 5 people bookmarking it, but still, that's hardly impressive.
What's my point?
Local news is a lost cause on the major social news sites.
No matter how much effort local bloggers and publishers pour into promoting their work on them, it's a lost cause. The audience there just doesn't care about local news unless its either a weird-news-of-the-day-type item or a big scandal a la Blagojevich.
Yes, the Chicago Tribune has been very successful in the last year on Digg. But have you seen the stories of theirs that make the front page? It's all national stuff, weird stuff, and photos.
While Digg and Reddit have done a great deal of good for technology news and national political news, they've done jack squat for local news. It's just not their thing.
And that's why the Windy Citizen exists, because there's a need for a service that democratizes Chicago media in the same way that those sites have democratized tech and political news.
If you are a Chicago blogger or Chicago publisher, know that the Windy Citizen has buttons of its own that work just like those from Digg and Reddit. The big difference is that when your stories hit The Windy Citizen, they will be seen by people who actually care about them. Why waste your time eking out 3 votes on Digg when there's a growing community of local insiders who'd love to check out your latest local coverage? Sure, the Citizen can't drop 5,000 readers on your front door, yet, but do you really think you're going to make the front page of Digg writing about local stuff? If the snub of this parking meter story doesn't show you how unlikely that is, I
don't know what will.
Thanks for your time, attention and love of all things Chicago.
I'll see you on the Citizen,
Brad
P.S.
I've been meaning to post an update about all the exciting things happening behind the scenes with the site, a progress report on our effort to find an advertising sales rep, Facebook Connect and lots more. Stay tuned!
Print
E-mail
BradFlora
Brad Flora is founder of WindyCitizen.com, a web service that lets people share their favorite Chicago news and events with their friends and neighbors. More
Comments
Your "buttons of its own" link is broken, you'll need an absolute URL because this blog is on a subdomain.
Great article though. I was talking with a friend just this afternoon about how important local social media sites will be going forward. You guys have done a great job bringing this concept to Chicago.
Thanks, George. Our setup's a little spotty with the internal linking sometimes. I made sure to get it fixed.
Post new comment