Today in hyper-local news: Fire Escape Dancers in Osage Alley

I was walking past Osage Alley on 24th street, and found a small crowd gathered to watch dancers practicing a routine on twin fire escapes.  Music was playing from somewhere as they danced in and out of their doors, up and down the fire escape stairs and ladders.

Recently, I’ve been getting curious about the idea of hyper-local news.  I’ve been following the mission mission blog lately.  I’m fascinated that I find myself interested in the most mundane news if it is about my familiar neighborhood.  I guess that’s just how people work.

On a related note, I’ve been kicking around the term meta-local to define a kind of online community that feels like a “local community” even though they are scattered geographically.  On one hand, the term is just one more obnoxious buzzword.  But, as online traffic becomes more interactive, online communities really do take on a local personality.  Just as urban planners map out sidewalks and civic passageways, maybe it is important to draw detailed maps of “virtual locality” and the interconnected neighborhoods that form between online communities.