I think it is fair to say that, traditionally, the online community has been defined by issues and communities of interest rather than by geographic place. There are websites dedicated to just about any issue you care to name and, similarly, there are places online for people interested in those issues to congregate.

What we do at Bang the Table, whilst issue based, is also heavily place based. We do not usually go seeking people interested in say cycling from around the planet to discuss a local cycling strategy – our interest is in people in the local area relevant to the strategy. This presents something of a challenge for our clients. How to get the word out. As we have written before in this blog we find that traditional media is the best way to do this.

It seems such a pity that, at a time when over 80% of Australian households have the internet, traditional media remains the best way to reach a geographically defined community. It says to me that there is a real opportunity for geographically based social networking sites. These sites would allow us to make contact with people in our own communities – real people with whom we may end up having personal as well as online relationships – the way real communities behave.

Some early attempts at this are out there already, I thought I might highlight a few and ask others to contribute with other examples.

Possibly the highest profile of these is Bright Kite which I think is best described as place based Twitter. The premise of the site is to mark where you are in the world and you can leave micro blog comments or post photos. It would be an excellent way to build up a travel diary but as yet lacks the feeling of having an active community in each place. What I observe is more a community of users who post while they travel than in situ communities using the site to discuss local issues. Of course the micro blog format can also be very constraining limiting the depth of conversation.

It would be wrong not to point out that this can also be done with Twitter which has an excellent search function (for some reason this is obscurely hidden on the site) which gives the site real power in terms of looking for people in a particular area.

We all know about Facebook groups. I have written a bit before about what my views on the limitations of Facebook as a community engagement tool. I also don’t see too much evidence of Facebook producing much meaningful community interaction. I have to say I don’t know why this is – Facebook groups ought at least in theory to offer a place for communities to congregate and discuss local issues but they rarely do. Perhaps a true place based community page needs a basis of local content to give people a reason to gather and to provide a basis for discussion.

At the other end of the scale there have been a number of attempts to develop community sites around Australia. This site for the Blue Mountains and this one for Bateman’s Bay are examples of a plethora of community sites that effectively offer a community directory and occasional local news rather than a chance for community building. There is no indication that they have any significant local readership. I think it more likely they are a useful resource for tourists.

More promising is a site being run by the Macquarie Radio network in Sydney called Street Corner which provides locally based content and discussions. I like these sites but, they don’t go far past a typical local newspaper website, though there is some space dedicated to local community groups.

Top of my list of community sites is the RiotACT from the ACT. This is a wonderful community asset. A site that features real local issues posted by a large and active membership. The content is entirely generated by users and there seems to be lively and active discussion about a whole range of issues. It is a genuinely local endeavour and I guess that helps. If only every town and city in Australia had a site like this…

Please let me know if you have other examples from here and overseas and I will feature them in a follow up article.