Doing Local Right

As a software consultant, I follow several technical blogs. One recent post talks about a topic relevant here: providing local information effectively and comprehensively. One example of how it's done well is lawrence.com

• A comprehensive events calendar (with editorially selected "best bets")


• Blogs by local residents


• Movie listings for local cinemas (with links to the reviews by both newspaper staff and members of the public)



• Detailed event coverage, including additional dates, weather forecasts for outdoor events in the next few days and an SMS/e-mail reminder service


• Gig listings that incorporate MP3 downloads (“if you go, you might hear”) from the 1,000+ MP3s of local bands hosted by the site


• Drink specials, which also appear on relevant event and venue pages


• The local band and music database, browseable by band, musician, genre and more



• The local restaurant listings, including kitchen hours (and hence the infamous restaurants open right now)


• The downloads page, which combines data from all over the site to present MP3s for download that are by bands which are playing gigs in the next week (“see ’em live at the Bottleneck”)

The first question is: what do we already have that approaches this need. The Metro Monthly has a comprehensive calendar of local events, but it's not particularly friendly in terms of filtering or sorting or searching. The Vindicator site has a dining directory and movie listings, but I don't see local events listed online.

A comprehensive local site, perhaps teamed up with either of those existing resources or some other I'm not aware of, would be a boon. We'll know we're really making progress when we have these resources coupled with neighborhood-centric audio walking tours available for download. Now that would be cool!