I don't remember local or small-town papers to [generally] being toxic or cesspools of hate.

However, one of my True Jokes is "NextDoor: Hate Your Neighbors" just as "Facebook: Hate Your Family & Friends" and "Twitter: Hate Your Heroes".

NextDoor sounds good, but it generally proves not. Everything from "suspicious teenagers on the sidewalk again" [meaning: local kids walking to their local home from the local school but Nosey Nancy is too busy "Taking Notes & Reporting To Police"] to "if public transit comes here so will the meth-head homeless pulling the rug out from under my overpriced house" [reality is baseless fears about recycling, commuting, and less cars on the road].

No, it is not.

The small town paper where I live sends someone to sit through city council meetings, which at times decide important things, but often debate relatively unimportant things in lengthly, excruciating detail. Like that time I went to comment about a housing issue that was important to me and had to sit through a discussion of the city sign code.

In any event, even people who care about one thing or the other are not going to report on the important goings-on of your city council or planning commission. If they happen to, it probably won't be anything like an unbiased account.

Not sure what to think of this article, as it runs very counter to my own ancedatal experience. I'm a realtor in a 35,000 person town (like described in the article) and I advertise on Nextdoor (or should I say I "sponsor" a neighborhood), but I've never had a lead come in that way and I've never heard anyone locally ever mention using nextdoor for anything. Meanwhile, everyone knows about the various Facebook groups that people use locally for referrals for cleaners, landscapers, local politics, et al.

Again, could be a geographical thing or just my anecdata, so FWIW.

For me, Nextdoor is primarily people looking for lost pets, complaining about "suspicious" strangers, and making dubious crime reports. That's hardly a replacement for a local newspaper.

Nextdoor seems to be whatever the local moderators make of it. Mine will censor political views (mostly from the right). They will also censor posts related to breaking of unpopular laws (such as those related to pet ownership responsibilities like leashes and waste removal).

I doubt that Nextdoor corporate has any oversight into the performance of the local mods, and there's no mechanism in place to report such abuse. Nextdoor is far less open than any newspaper, which will usually at least have an editorial page.

I gave up on NextDoor after one day. I subscribe to 2 local daily papers. I get a wider range of news and the awareness of local events/new restaurants than I do online (where my news consumption is 90% via RSS (innoreader, excellent app btw)).

I've found that since covid, the local papers have done some impressive longform deep dive stories (science, health, human interest). NextDoor is a social media platform which trades on emotional responses, I'm saddened to read that it may be the only news source for some localities.

Maybe it is just my nextdoor area but very little relevant community information is found, in fact most all discussions of schools, local politics, and HOAs immediately disappear. Most posts are looking for a local service provider or missing pets. That coupled with the non chronological feeds make me think that Nextdoor only wants to become an Angie's List and not a source of actual good for my community.

I must wonder whether the misinformation is the excuse and not the reason, as there are plenty of places in America where school funding is a major state issue and that doesn't change a thing.

Oklahoma has a shortage of teachers and election after election, the population collectively shrugs.

I haven't ever heard someone openly oppose education. Privately, I have heard plenty of people say "kids can make do" and "I don't want to pay for other people's kids."

I tried Nextdoor but quickly closed the app when it was filled with rumors about who in the neighborhood isn't cleaning up after their dog. Maybe I'm throwing away the baby with the bath water, but I don't feel like I miss out on all that much by forgoing yet another social media platform vying for my attention

Were small-town papers just as toxic, or is it just my community here in SF?

In the last month, on NextDoor, they doxxed and banded together to get the mentally-challenged skateboarder who’s been my neighborhood for years, and had him arrested because a user felt threatened by him standing around the neighborhood shouting obscenities during manic episodes. (He’s now in jail and this NextDoor thread is trying to make that permanent.)

And today there is a discussion and petition to end the Sanchez slow streets because they are “dangerous” to children and bikers due to cross-traffic and somehow “driving down property costs.”

I suppose all of that can be found on whatever social media site you choose - Twitter, Facebook, etc. But it seems extra pervasive on NextDoor, and I think the internet would be a little better off without the platform as a whole.

If anything it should enable a better small town paper if there is sufficient "throughput". I know in city neighborhoods the volume is ridiculous for a casual user, but for a "neighborhood newspaper" it should be a goldmine for content, leads, perspective, gossip, and things that would make a weekly newspaper a fun read.

The problem seems to be that the writers and editors are all volunteers and that will necessarily mean a great variation in quality on both jobs. On top of this, their comment system seems stuck in "sort by controversial".

There is a lot of work that needs to be done - moderating, getting good data, presenting information well. That doesn't jibe with people doing it for free. At least on YouTube or Instagram you could personally strike it rich off being a successful enough contributor.

Is there a way to get good users paid from this? Can you tip moderators? Would people? Maybe, as the newspapers used to do, a subscription fee could be added once a certain growth point was reached. X dollars a month per user, some percentage goes to mods, some percentage goes to people whose comments you liked, some percentage goes to keeping the servers running.

Originally, our Nextdoor "group" was maybe 75 nearby neighbors, 50% of which I knew. Low traffic, high quality. (No ads)

Later they opened things up to maybe 5000 "nearby" neighbors, 1% of which I know. That totally changed the dynamic.

And yes, a few dozen who dominate every discussion. No thanks.

I wonder if the problem is just size?

I split time between two places - one in Brooklyn and the other in a small coastal New Jersey town of 4000 (Atlantic Highlands).

I never bothered using Nextdoor in Brooklyn or Manhattan but I’ve found it pleasant and useful for things like plumber and handyman recommendations, awareness about what’s going on with large noises (naval exercises / dredging) etc. etc.

It’s definitely moderated heavily and I’ve seen political posts removed which I’m fine with - just not what I’m looking for out of it. But it has been generally pleasant enough that I find myself actually reading the email digests and interacting.

By contrast I’ve deleted and disabled Instagram and Facebook and am trying to wean myself off of ever looking for content on Twitter even though I’m purely readonly there.

Given that independent local newspapers are in decline because of Craigslist, FB, ND, and other social media, what could be a good outcome?

Does ND acquire Patch/Hoodline for quality content? This would only work in metro areas they cover.

Or perhaps ND partners with local newspapers and pays them for content? This is more difficult to scale but offers a lifeline to local newspapers who’d otherwise continue to decline in the digital era.

I lament concentration of media, but one can’t deny there are economies of scale in digital media and algorithmic advertising on a national level. It has largely come to pass already in local TV news with Sinclair Broadcasting. I don’t know how these trends can be reversed.

I live in London. When the pandemic started last year, our street organised themselves into a WhatsApp group and quite quickly majority of the household were on it. Our next door neighbour even made a list of households with the names next to them. Initially it looked OK, as most things when you just getting started. People were offering each other to pick up groceries or some other services in case they can't leave their house,etc. Just for the context, the street is in an affluent area with very high stats on virtually any social measure. Also, most properties are residential houses with only a handful apartment blocks. After only a couple of weeks,if not sooner, the usual patterns started to appear: people were trying to find their position in the group,so organisers, helpers,fools,and other categories started to emerge. People started sharing their nonproblems and asking for help,while subsequently ignoring all the advices given to them. Entire street kept quiet for days about an old campervan parked on the street when someone plastered it with abusive writings,until someone said they don't support that kind of behaviour. Shortly after the entire street joined and made tons of comment on how bad it is. Then people complain about their neighbours without even trying to talk to them. Others pretend they care about some causes,while doing the exact opposite and etc. Eventually the group was getting less and less posts and it got to the point where the street was before the pandemic: quiet, very few know their neighbours 3 houses down the road, social classes,etc. All this on a street with less than a hundred buildings, so I can imagine what larger neighborhoods and groups are like.

I like the idea of Nextdoor, but everyone (seriously, everyone) in my small town in convinced that it's a scam. There was an article going around a few years back about scammers running their scams on nextdoor, and now they all believe that it's a scam so they stay on facebook in their groups.

Of course, this is not ideal. There is a big difference between journalism and message boards -- though that isn't to say, of course, that there can't room for both.

We've been working on a platform reimagining how local news can operate -- taking whats good from social media (the format and distribution), but maintaining journalistic rigor.

We cannot lose journalism.

https://blog.nillium.com/defending-journalism-to-defend-the-...

Forgive my ignorance but who uses something like Nextdoor? Is it used mainly in suburban communities? I could never imagine anyone using it in any of the urban centres I have lived in.

I lasted about one week on Nexdoor. Maybe it's just my neighborhood, but it felt like the weirdest passive-aggressive digital version of everyone peeking out their blinds. Endless worries about someone getting packages stolen, what the city was doing to our park, who in the neighborhood was secretly Antifa or QAnon, and endless screenshots of security cameras. Noped right out.

Nextdoor is a walled garden. I can pick up a small-town paper, often for free even and read to my delight. No one has to know who I am and I don't have to be a part of the neighborhood.

I think the inclusive nature of Nextdoor is a net negative and both perpetuates fear having to do with home owners' security and separates the in-crowd from others in the neighborhood.

Interestingly, I see local journalists occasionally reaching out to people who have posted on ND and writing articles based on what they have posted. It's not the most common thing, but I wouldn't be surprised if local journalists watched ND for trends/topics to cover.

I found it very useful to get community information and general help when I first moved in.

I don't know how big it is, but at least for us, Patch has replaced our local small-town paper a lot better than Nextdoor ever did. Actually get news about our city that way.

That being said, the comments section on Patch is borderline QAnon with conspiracy theories and tends to be extremely hateful of the local/state government, but the actual articles are solid and useful.

This is contrary to my Nextdoor experience in middle America suburbs. Most of the posting is fairly benign posting of lost/found dogs or cats, craigslist like sales, asking for HVAC/contracting referrals, or suggesting people support certain small businesses during COVID.

The other day an elderly couple put up a post asking for help removing snow and ice from their sidewalk/driveway because they are disabled. About a half dozen people showed up to help them including a plow driver which I thought was very nice.

I don't go there expecting deep or thought provoking content but it's nice to see if neighbors can help each other or understanding what the general consensus of your area is.

Small town papers had letters to the editor that could get quite colorful but there was a modicum of class on the part of most editors not to publish to the truly disgusting. Nextdoor style discussion were previously relegated to inner social circles after dropping your kids off at soccer.

San Francisco NextDoor is a mad house and should be nuked from orbit.

It is a mixture of excessive empathy resulting in half measures that just enable destructive behaviors, and on the other side is those trying to start a pogrom against the visibly unhoused and mentally challenged!

There’s nothing in between!

Try to point out something from how any other city creates a functioning society and you’ll get reported, your post censored in that process, and booted off the platform! I don't have any suggestions for that city, in case you were looking for one to determine if I was someone you wanted to listen to or invalidate.

That place is Detroit West get out if you can. They always wanted you to leave, and artists will be able to afford it again just like they wished! Detroit has artists too.

I came to say the same thing. NextDoor is toxic. In our neighbor we had the same sort of issue with a mentally-challenged teenager. He likely stole someone’s election sign and the neighborhood flipped out. Zero love. Zero compassion for a mentally challenged boy.

My first interaction with Next-door in Cupertino:

Neighbor: "There is a suspicious man walking around the neighborhood!!" (includes blurry picture)

Me: "What makes his suspicious?"

N: "He's black and wearing a hoodie! We don't have people like that around here"

M: "Being black doesn't make him suspicious. Would you say a white man in a hoodie is suspicious? Because we don't have a lot of those around here either"

Then I muted the thread.

Where my family lives, the newspaper there has a two page column with a catchy name, and it's simply daily complaints from residents about EVERYTHING. As a "treat" my family will cut out some of the most wild one's and mail them to me to remind me of what i'm missing.

It's not as clearly racist as much of nextdoor tends to be, but it's everything from "why are the christmas lights up already", to "if they build a hooters drunks will crash their car into my house", and "vote no to the bus route expansion, we have enough traffic"

NextDoor seems to be an ineffective method of community pressure for incarceration.

The driver suspected of killing a pedestrian after causing an eight-car collision while intoxicated in S.F. on Thursday was facing charges in another DUI case. He was arrested at least seven times in the Bay Area since being released from prison in April.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/Suspect-in-fatal-S...

it's interesting that despite using real names and location(ish), the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory still seems to be in full force on NextDoor.

Nextdoor is a cesspool of NIMBYs.

Is this the same guy that I regularly see skating down Stevens Creek Blvd with headphones on while shouting random stuff while ignoring pretty much every traffic law? Cuz I definitely don't feel safe around people that unpredictable.