One startup that’s been on my radar (which isn’t yet available in Canada) is Nextdoor. They describe themselves as a “private social network for your neighborhood” and are active in more than 22,500 American neighborhoods. To date they’ve raised $100M in venture funding.
From what I can tell, their primary focus (and big value proposition) has been around safety and security. Residents can use it to report incidents, such as a car break in. There are obviously other use cases, but I keep hearing this one come up. And I think it works because the community is so closely controlled. Every address is verified.
But a few things come to mind as I read about their success and growth (400% neighborhood growth over the past year). How many social networks can people handle? Why can’t this be done using an existing platform (and perhaps a closed group)? And is there an opportunity to create the same kind of closed social network for condo and apartment buildings?
There are lots of social networks out there. Whether you’re a wine snob or a pet owner, somebody has thought it. But if Path’s recent struggles are any indication, niche social networks can be tough. Which is why Nextdoor seems like a bit of an outlier to me.
But I think the success of Nextdoor stems from the fact that, even in our hyper connected world, a lot of us, paradoxically, still don’t know the people who live right beside us. And I think this is also the case in multi-family dwellings. It’s a problem I’ve thought about and discussed with an number of my condo-dwelling friends.
So I look forward to seeing how Nextdoor evolves and also seeing if they end up expanding to condos and apartments.
One of the biggest news pieces of the last few weeks—at least in retail and tech circles—has been Amazon’s unmanned aerial delivery drones (also known as Amazon Air Prime). In case you missed it, here’s a video from Amazon showing them in action.
The goal:
"To get packages into customers’ hands in 30 minutes or less using unmanned aerial vehicles."
Now, this won’t happen for another few years, if even that soon, but I think it’s pretty clear that this is something epic in the making. If successful, it’s going to completely rewrite, not only the retail landscape, but probably the landscape of our cities.
If you think about it, cars enabled a certain kind of retail. They enabled big box stores and those, in turn, changed our cities (for the worse, I would argue). Now what happens when the undifferentiated products of a big box store can be flown to my door step in less than 30 minutes? Suddenly getting into my car seems archaic.
Yesterday, I discovered a Jerusalem-based Italian photographer by the name of Vittoria Mentasti. She has an ongoing project called “A Woman With Two Names”, that’s exploring the identity of Canada’s Inuit community in Iqaluit, Nunavut. Click on the photo below to see the entire gallery.
Here’s her language on the project:
"Iqaluit, the capital of Nunavut, is a city of 7000 people surrounded by tundra and the sea. The only way to get in or out of Iqaluit is from the air. I was interested in the cultural identity shift the Intuit community is experiencing and its consequences. The community, especially its younger members, are trapped between two worlds; they are losing touch with their past and are headed towards an uncertain future.
One startup that’s been on my radar (which isn’t yet available in Canada) is Nextdoor. They describe themselves as a “private social network for your neighborhood” and are active in more than 22,500 American neighborhoods. To date they’ve raised $100M in venture funding.
From what I can tell, their primary focus (and big value proposition) has been around safety and security. Residents can use it to report incidents, such as a car break in. There are obviously other use cases, but I keep hearing this one come up. And I think it works because the community is so closely controlled. Every address is verified.
But a few things come to mind as I read about their success and growth (400% neighborhood growth over the past year). How many social networks can people handle? Why can’t this be done using an existing platform (and perhaps a closed group)? And is there an opportunity to create the same kind of closed social network for condo and apartment buildings?
There are lots of social networks out there. Whether you’re a wine snob or a pet owner, somebody has thought it. But if Path’s recent struggles are any indication, niche social networks can be tough. Which is why Nextdoor seems like a bit of an outlier to me.
But I think the success of Nextdoor stems from the fact that, even in our hyper connected world, a lot of us, paradoxically, still don’t know the people who live right beside us. And I think this is also the case in multi-family dwellings. It’s a problem I’ve thought about and discussed with an number of my condo-dwelling friends.
So I look forward to seeing how Nextdoor evolves and also seeing if they end up expanding to condos and apartments.
One of the biggest news pieces of the last few weeks—at least in retail and tech circles—has been Amazon’s unmanned aerial delivery drones (also known as Amazon Air Prime). In case you missed it, here’s a video from Amazon showing them in action.
The goal:
"To get packages into customers’ hands in 30 minutes or less using unmanned aerial vehicles."
Now, this won’t happen for another few years, if even that soon, but I think it’s pretty clear that this is something epic in the making. If successful, it’s going to completely rewrite, not only the retail landscape, but probably the landscape of our cities.
If you think about it, cars enabled a certain kind of retail. They enabled big box stores and those, in turn, changed our cities (for the worse, I would argue). Now what happens when the undifferentiated products of a big box store can be flown to my door step in less than 30 minutes? Suddenly getting into my car seems archaic.
Yesterday, I discovered a Jerusalem-based Italian photographer by the name of Vittoria Mentasti. She has an ongoing project called “A Woman With Two Names”, that’s exploring the identity of Canada’s Inuit community in Iqaluit, Nunavut. Click on the photo below to see the entire gallery.
Here’s her language on the project:
"Iqaluit, the capital of Nunavut, is a city of 7000 people surrounded by tundra and the sea. The only way to get in or out of Iqaluit is from the air. I was interested in the cultural identity shift the Intuit community is experiencing and its consequences. The community, especially its younger members, are trapped between two worlds; they are losing touch with their past and are headed towards an uncertain future.
covering Amazon’s drones and the history of American retailing in Atlantic Cities. They do a better job conveying the potential magnitude of Amazon Air Prime and so I suggest you have a read if this topic interests you.
forced assimilation carried out by the Canadian Government
and the Church during the first half of the 20th century, deprived the Inuit of their social and spiritual customs. The transition away from their nomadic roots to modernized living has led to alcoholism, domestic violence and unemployment; symptoms of a society that is floating between its past and present.
Photographing off-moments of everyday life, I was looking to depict the sense of isolation, their ancestral connection to a harsh land, and the feeling of not belonging to “The South”, the way Inuit refers to the rest of the world.”
As one of the most remote and sparsely populated regions in the world, it’s easy to overlook what’s happening here in our country. But there are real problems in our north. In 2011, the Globe and Mail published a Focus Feature on Nunavut where it asked: Is Nunavut a failure of Canadian nation building?
"The rate of violent crime per capita in Nunavut is nine times what it is in the rest of Canada. The homicide rate is around 1,000 per cent of the Canadian average."
I’m not an expert on this matter, but it seems like everybody is picking up on the same phenomenon. We’ve created an in-between society. A society that’s completely ill-equipped to compete in the modern world, but that’s too far removed from its roots to turn back now. They were nomads and now they’re not.
This is hugely problematic and it’s only going to get worse. Already we’re seeing rising income inequality within “The South.” The returns to being smart are being amplified and twenty somethings with a killer app are turning down billion dollar acquisition offers.
What do you think this does to the north? I’d bet it makes it much worse.
a great article
covering Amazon’s drones and the history of American retailing in Atlantic Cities. They do a better job conveying the potential magnitude of Amazon Air Prime and so I suggest you have a read if this topic interests you.
forced assimilation carried out by the Canadian Government
and the Church during the first half of the 20th century, deprived the Inuit of their social and spiritual customs. The transition away from their nomadic roots to modernized living has led to alcoholism, domestic violence and unemployment; symptoms of a society that is floating between its past and present.
Photographing off-moments of everyday life, I was looking to depict the sense of isolation, their ancestral connection to a harsh land, and the feeling of not belonging to “The South”, the way Inuit refers to the rest of the world.”
As one of the most remote and sparsely populated regions in the world, it’s easy to overlook what’s happening here in our country. But there are real problems in our north. In 2011, the Globe and Mail published a Focus Feature on Nunavut where it asked: Is Nunavut a failure of Canadian nation building?
"The rate of violent crime per capita in Nunavut is nine times what it is in the rest of Canada. The homicide rate is around 1,000 per cent of the Canadian average."
I’m not an expert on this matter, but it seems like everybody is picking up on the same phenomenon. We’ve created an in-between society. A society that’s completely ill-equipped to compete in the modern world, but that’s too far removed from its roots to turn back now. They were nomads and now they’re not.
This is hugely problematic and it’s only going to get worse. Already we’re seeing rising income inequality within “The South.” The returns to being smart are being amplified and twenty somethings with a killer app are turning down billion dollar acquisition offers.
What do you think this does to the north? I’d bet it makes it much worse.
