The Chainlink

(NBR) Every block shut down.

Not a big poster on it but what happened?

http://chicago.everyblock.com/

We’re sorry to report that EveryBlock has closed its doors.

It’s no secret that the news industry is in the midst of a massive change. Within the world of neighborhood news there’s an exciting pace of innovation yet increasing challenges to building a profitable business. Though EveryBlock has been able to build an engaged community over the years, we’re faced with the decision to wrap things up.

Thank you for having let us play a role in how you get your neighborhood news. Thanks for the contributions, for the questions, and for allowing us to connect you to each other, in many cases to make great things happen in your community. Along the way, we hope we’ve helped you be a better neighbor.

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Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on February 8, 2013 at 10:05am

Good riddance IMHO.

Everyblock was poorly-run and suffered from heavy-handed moderation.  The person responsible for moderating the Chicago-area discussion, Becca, was terrible and would step into discussions and censor opinions of folks she didn't agree with.  It got ridiculous at times but Becca had free rein and no oversite was ever exercised from the top on her consistently-poor moderating.

Finally, when they implemented the down-voting of comments the forum became an echo-chamber of the majority with minority opinions being down-frakked into deletion.   In many of the anti-bike discussions the anti-bike members of Everyblock would delete the opposing viewpoint posts of riders until they were completely hidden/deleted/censored.  There are were a lot of anti-bike members using Everyblock and they would jump, en mass, on some of the pro-bike participants to down-frak and snuff them right out.  

So Everyblock got the plug pulled on it?  Good riddance to a bad site if you ask me. 

With the open-sourced nature of the internet something else will pop up to fill any need that Everyblock half-assed filled -and one that isn't a walled-garden like Everyblock. 

Permalink Reply by Jeremy on February 8, 2013 at 11:12am

If anyone cares, Chicagoist has a decent write up of the shut down, http://chicagoist.com/2013/02/07/everyblock_closes_down_without_war.... 

I admit, I liked everyblock b/c of its ability to confirm that I wasn't crazy if I thought I heard gunshots at 4 AM.  Hop on later that morning and some concerned citizen was certain to have posted about it, and then spend the rest of their post bemoaning the downturn the neighborhood had taken and how much better things used to be. 

Permalink Reply by Julie Aberman (Hochstadter) on February 8, 2013 at 11:24am

good article by chicagoist.

Jeremy said:

If anyone cares, Chicagoist has a decent write up of the shut down, http://chicagoist.com/2013/02/07/everyblock_closes_down_without_war.... 

I admit, I liked everyblock b/c of its ability to confirm that I wasn't crazy if I thought I heard gunshots at 4 AM.  Hop on later that morning and some concerned citizen was certain to have posted about it, and then spend the rest of their post bemoaning the downturn the neighborhood had taken and how much better things used to be. 

Permalink Reply by Julie Aberman (Hochstadter) on February 8, 2013 at 11:25am

The down and up voting works for Reddit, right?    That feature has been suggested for The Chainlink.

James BlackHeron said:

Finally, when they implemented the down-voting of comments the forum became an echo-chamber of the majority with minority opinions being down-frakked into deletion.   In many of the anti-bike discussions the anti-bike members of Everyblock would delete the opposing viewpoint posts of riders until they were completely hidden/deleted/censored.  There are were a lot of anti-bike members using Everyblock and they would jump, en mass, on some of the pro-bike participants to down-frak and snuff them right out.  

With the open-sourced nature of the internet something else will pop up to fill any need that Everyblock half-assed filled -and one that isn't a walled-garden like Everyblock. 

Permalink Reply by Paul G on February 8, 2013 at 11:51am

Is there an Everyblock substitute?

Permalink Reply by Julie Aberman (Hochstadter) on February 8, 2013 at 11:59am

from comments on everyblock blog

http://www.loclville.com/

https://nextdoor.com/

http://signup.wikiblock.com/

http://qa.romio.com/question/list

Paul G said:

Is there an Everyblock substitute?

Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on February 8, 2013 at 12:02pm

User "cred" is a good concept.  But it's more complex than "good/bad" because it is so subjective.  

Once it is allowed to hide/censor unpopular opinions and people then what it turns a forum into is a Prom.  The popular kids bask in the glory and the unpopular geeks in the corner get the tarp thrown over them.  If that is what people want, fine.  But it isn't a place where some of the most innovative and and "geeky" folks will want to hang out.

Exclusion is always ugly IMHO.

Then again, I'm usually the first person voted off the island in these types of communities...  I guess some folks would just love that opportunity. 


Julie Hochstadter said:

The down and up voting works for Reddit, right?    That feature has been suggested for The Chainlink.

Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on February 8, 2013 at 1:28pm

Totally with James here.  There is a lot of stuff that established forums do that is horrible. Just because it "seems" to work for them doesn't mean it's worth implementing elsewhere. 

Moderation should be limited to managing -clear- attacks on a forum or its users.


James BlackHeron said:

User "cred" is a good concept.  But it's more complex than "good/bad" because it is so subjective.  

Once it is allowed to hide/censor unpopular opinions and people then what it turns a forum into is a Prom.  The popular kids bask in the glory and the unpopular geeks in the corner get the tarp thrown over them.  If that is what people want, fine.  But it isn't a place where some of the most innovative and and "geeky" folks will want to hang out.

Exclusion is always ugly IMHO.

Then again, I'm usually the first person voted off the island in these types of communities...  I guess some folks would just love that opportunity. 


Julie Hochstadter said:

The down and up voting works for Reddit, right?    That feature has been suggested for The Chainlink.

Permalink Reply by Tony Adams on February 8, 2013 at 2:39pm

I agree - moderation needs to be used with extreme uh, moderation. And yes, most forums have a ton of room for improvement.

Also,

Pretty great piece on how to shut down a community site:

http://www.knightdigitalmediacenter.org/blogs/agahran/2013/02/every...


h' 1.0 said:

Totally with James here.  There is a lot of stuff that established forums do that is horrible. Just because it "seems" to work for them doesn't mean it's worth implementing elsewhere. 

Moderation should be limited to managing -clear- attacks on a forum or its users.


James BlackHeron said:

User "cred" is a good concept.  But it's more complex than "good/bad" because it is so subjective.  

Once it is allowed to hide/censor unpopular opinions and people then what it turns a forum into is a Prom.  The popular kids bask in the glory and the unpopular geeks in the corner get the tarp thrown over them.  If that is what people want, fine.  But it isn't a place where some of the most innovative and and "geeky" folks will want to hang out.

Exclusion is always ugly IMHO.

Then again, I'm usually the first person voted off the island in these types of communities...  I guess some folks would just love that opportunity. 


Julie Hochstadter said:

The down and up voting works for Reddit, right?    That feature has been suggested for The Chainlink.

Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on February 8, 2013 at 4:35pm

You know.... I have come full circle and am back to my original suspicion that there is some sort of litigation behind the sudden inaccessibility of Everyblock.


Tony Adams 6.6 mi said:

Also,

Pretty great piece on how to shut down a community site:

http://www.knightdigitalmediacenter.org/blogs/agahran/2013/02/every...

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