Connecting Local Communities

A growing theme within Web 2.0 are community-oriented services – whether it’s search (iBegin) or personal connections (Favorville) or Canocal, which has created a service where people can find and share information, reviews and opinions about places, events, businesses, etc. within their communities across Canada. The challenge facing many of these community sites is getting enough users to make them useful. In theory, Canocal looks interesting but there’s not enough information currently on it (at least concerning Toronto) to make it a must-visit site. Within the restaurant review section, for example, there are many categories no listings. This is not to dismiss Canocal’s efforts but it does demonstrate how difficult it can be to turn a good idea into a useful service. The optimist in me suggests you have to start somewhere so Canocal simply needs to keep pushing and promoting however it can. The pessimist suggests maybe this is a solution in search of a problem, or there are too many other similar services out there, or there’s little demand for this kind of service.