Backfence Goes Live in Palo Alto

Back in April, hyper-local community and user-generated content site Backfence announced the acquisition of Bayosphere, Dan Gillmor’s San Francisco Bay Area-based user-generated content and blogging Web site.

CEO Susan DeFife just e-mailed me to let me know the site has officially gone live in Palo Alto, its first Bay Area community (previously operated only in Washington, D.C., area suburbs). Four more Bay Area communities will be launched in the next few months, according to the company.

The Bay Area should be a good market for Backfence, given that it is a relatively tech-savvy region with a proven affinity for user-generated content and online communities (heck, it’s the place where Craigslist was born, raised and continues to thrive). It also appears that Gillmor will stay on as a contributor, which should be a boon for the site.

We’ll watch the site develop and examine it closer in the near future. In the meantime, check it out for yourself and let us know what you think.