So I was pretty relieved that you all aren’t clamoring for a Technoccult message board, since I don’t really want to moderate one.
But here’s another idea: a basic directory of readers organized by geographic location. It would have only the barest of profiles: name or handle, location, optional couchsurfing.com profile link, and space to add one or two more links (to Twitter or a blog or Facebook or whatever you want). Also an optional e-mail form, so that you can be contacted through the directory w/o displaying your e-mail address.
I don’t know of any off the shelf solution for this so it would have to be built from scratch. It should be simple but I wouldn’t want to get started on an undertaking like this if there’s not interest.
What do you think?
January 28, 2009 at 10:49 pm
Er, not to be rude or anything, but…why?
January 28, 2009 at 10:54 pm
So that Technoccult readers can find other readers in their cities, or meet other readers while traveling.
January 28, 2009 at 10:56 pm
Weblog reader mapping systems already exist – just google around for one
January 28, 2009 at 10:57 pm
i think this is a great idea! i live in Utah and it’s not always very easy to find like-minded freaks to hang out with. 🙂
January 28, 2009 at 11:09 pm
It would be useful from a metadata perspective to note where your readers are geographically for readership targeting purposes, but I’m not sure that it would be worth it from an overhead-to-usefulness ratio.
January 28, 2009 at 11:13 pm
@StMae I can find that info out from reading my referrer logs, so it wouldn’t be all that useful from a datamining perspective. I’m just seeing if readers would want to be able to find each other through such a thing.
@Xman – I’ll look into it if enough people are interested.
January 28, 2009 at 11:33 pm
I think it’s a good idea because I have no friggin clue if there are any UK readers here?
January 29, 2009 at 12:10 am
Some map tools…
http://www.batchgeocode.com/
http://mashable.com/2009/01/08/google-maps-mashups-tools/
http://twittervision.com/
http://www.wikimapia.org/
http://www.openstreetmap.org/
http://www.maptools.org/
… and an idea. Make this seasonal. From X to Y you can enter and edit the info, then it gets locked up or goes away. This prevents info decay. Prevents good things too, but I think it works out in favor of limited but actual usefulness instead of ongoing but not-really useful. Error correction is priority one.
January 29, 2009 at 12:14 am
@Trevor
Thanks for the list. If at all possible I’d like for whatever we end up with to be hosted on technocclt.com, not living on a 3rd party’s server (like Frappr, which you didn’t mention).
January 29, 2009 at 12:27 am
Plus, as an added bonus, if you tracked the data seasonally as Trevor suggests, you could decipher the previously unknown mysteries of Technoccult reader migration patterns, find out if they are affected by cutting old growth forests, changes in populations of other species, and such.
January 29, 2009 at 5:31 am
I think it’s a great idea. Why should assorted law enforcement and intelligence agencies be the only ones to have one?
January 29, 2009 at 8:35 am
I like the idea.
January 29, 2009 at 9:27 am
me too
January 29, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Klintron: I tried to list only open source projects that can be hived at your complex. That’s why I didn’t list Frappr.
January 29, 2009 at 8:03 pm
I’d like to be on it and find other readers nearby.
January 29, 2009 at 10:59 pm
im down
January 30, 2009 at 3:37 pm
Why not ? BTW; I’m from freaky Poland:)
February 1, 2009 at 10:57 pm
It would be nice for technoccult to reflect a community. “Putting the Cult in Technoccult.” Maybe something like Ning.com if it moves to a move social network element.
February 3, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Hi from chilly Ukraine! and thanks for all the fish)
February 4, 2009 at 11:03 pm
Sign me up.
I’m using umapper though I don’t know how it works yet.
My co-conspiritor does the technical.
I just supply the crazy.