Haiku intros from Michael Sauers.

Charle Lyons. Baby and a toddler make him tired and happy. Notes annotated by his three-year old.

Local information- what about our backyard? The death of distance.

Global is local online- easier to get info about space shuttles than your neighborhood online.

Google maps- find 4k barbers in the area. but what about local knowledge?
Google has problem of scale- they have global, but they’re working on local.
Rules for each level of universe. Galaxies behave differently than solar systems, etc.

information behaves differently at different scales.
I’m in ur community, informin ur lolcatz

Google is starting to add in local info for all searches.
Sketchup 3Dmodels of physical surroundings
Local news (this doesn’t really work in Factiva or Lexis)

Geographic information- google maps experiments.

If google’s doing this, we should be paying attention.
True potential of local web is more 2.0 then google is right now. hyperlocal, deeper.

Local web is:
diverse
Local search engines
maps
local media
local government
photos/images/videos
local blogs
locally focussed social networks
you! locals

user-generated content from locals (cletus the slack-jawed local)

(I wonder if the local web can overcome the “local” nonsense from Clear Channel et al? -kate)

Pothole repair schedule is boring to everyone but the people who live where the potholes are.

Local Web is about joining real world and virtual world. Web was originally about escaping real world, but it’s coming back to earth. Not as isolating as Web was originally seen as being. The local web is bringing a sense of place to the internet. becoming big business.

http://deweyandmain.wordpress.com/

Libraries brining sense of place to Internet. but what else can we do?
be more:
participatory?
hyperlocal?

this is a big opportunity for libraries. most people live their lives within a 20 mile radius. everyday life is still local, the internet is getting more local, libraries are community-focussed organizations with experience aggregating and managing information.

participate in existing local resources, create own local resources

Local Search
used to be like phone books.
now provide real-time and neighborhood data. Google’s click and drag directions, Ask’s walking directions.
Libraries can enhance their listings in these local search engines. add in images, links, etc.
CSEs
mycommunityinfo.ca london pl major contributor

Local Blogs
placeblogs/metroblogs/neighblogs
placeblogger is directory of local blogs
metroblogging is large network of placeblogs (?)

Darien Community Matters blog. Yes!

Local News

Topix etc.
comingling new and old media. news stories with blog entries and local photos etc.
mapping info
you can suggest sites to these aggregators- define your own community

SkokieTalk and MyHamilton.ca
Canadians are good at localness, no?

Local Data

Everyblock. has lots of info you’d never see in local paper. aggregating local data (like building permits) calling it news.
news articles/restaurant inspections (ignorance might be bliss here)/liquor license/etc
data available online wasn’t always user-friendly. often in gov’t silo as well. sites like everyblock draw it out and make it available elsewhere.

Hartfordinfo.org (is this Hartford CT? where “We don’t care”?)
Libraries can do this.

Localpedia? Wikipedia has good overview of many places. Libraries can use wikis to make it more granular.
Geotagging. Photos very commonly geotagged- Flickr.
Makes it easier to find locally relevant photos. georss.
LoC with their flickr deal
AADL’s picture Ann Arbor
Allen County PL Day in the Life Indiana

Maps

key component
Google MyMaps
creation of custom maps getting easy. anyone can do it.

Libraries can build on local data. there’s no successful biz model for local data yet. Libraries can tap into local passion. Identification of local info not yet automatable. appropriate endeavor for libraries? Trust is ver important for this. Libraries have trust of locals. Supports many library missions.

Is library way out on periphery? Is that bad? Long Tail says being outlier is okay. But some want to be the center of it all and can do it.
John Udell’s remixing the library.

Library should be local because of something deeper than location.