Yes, I am still maintaining the site. I do think it helps alot to keep us better connected, though it’s fairly quiet most of the time. People tend to post when they need help with a lost package or a missing pet, etc, and the responsiveness in these times of “emergency” is impressive. They typically post via an “all neighbors” category set up to send an email to every member for every post. The other categories all have typical notification levels so people only get emailed when they are participating.
There are some people who log in more regularly to post but it’s fairly intermittent. One neighbor created a “free for the taking” topic, which I liked.
Chat has also been interesting for reaching out directly to people instead of calling them or sending them a text. Yesterday I saw on craigslist that someone nearby was giving away chicks and I sent a chat to a neighbor who keeps chickens (and shares eggs with me!) to let him know. He was emailed, logged in and replied.
Now that I am community manager in charge of the Discourse community I am learning new super powers that I am considering putting to work in my neighborhood forum! But for now I’ve been satisfied just keeping it running in the background with minimal effort, and responding when others take initiative.
If I were to do more, it would be to:
- meet up with some of the more active members to browse the site together and decide on how we want to set it up and use it
- try to recruit some more moderators to help manage the community and stimulate activity
- organize activities that interest me using the forum (eg block party, trash cleanup, bus shelter gardening, emergency prep, etc etc)
- look for other initiatives happening outside the forum and reach out to people organizing them, and let them know about the forum
Here’s what the site looks like to me now, on the horizon theme:
