Outside.in, a major aggregator of local blogs, has begun the integration with CNN that was announced last December at our Interactive Local Media conference in L.A. First up is integration with CNN’s home page, weather page and profile page. On the home page, users can click on Local Weather & News in the right sidebar, enter their ZIP code and get local news. On the weather page, headlines appear below the map when ZIP codes are entered. On the profile page, “local news” appears on the right.

Outside.in emphasizes that this is just the beginning of a broad integration, and will position the company for integration with any site. “To support the one billion+ monthly page views on CNN.com, our team tackled the challenge of massively scaling our platform and providing CNN with a robust, yet flexible API to meet all their needs. The integration allows us to drive exposure and traffic throughout the news ecosystem to publishers of all sizes,” notes an internal communication.

In other local aggregator news, MSNBC’s EveryBlock has teamed with New Haven-based SeeClickFix to enable consumers in each of EveryBlock’s 16 cities to report and view civic issues reported in their neighborhoods (i.e., “Stop sign needed at corner of El Camino Real”).

The ad-supported site, which emphasizes mobile reporting, has previously teamed with a number of top newspapers, including The New York Times, The Journal Register, Boston.com, NorthJersey.com, Philly.com, Dallas Morning News and The New Haven Independent. It follows in the footsteps of E-The-People, a site that pioneered civic reporting in its work with more than 100 newspapers 10 years ago.

“The work that EveryBlock has done to free up local data has been instrumental in creating the kind of environment in which tools like SeeClickFix can thrive and create real positive change through greater civic participation,” said SeeClickFix CEO Ben Berkowitz in a release. “SeeClickFix maintains an open data policy so that like-minded sites like EveryBlock can put our users content in front of their users, and we can work to create a larger environment of open local communication for the greater good of our neighborhoods.”

The post Outside.in Begins Integration With CNN appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

MSNBC.com’s EveryBlock is moving beyond its roots as a hard-core aggregator of hyperlocal data with its first social feature: “Notify Your Neighbors.” The feature, which has been tested for over a month, is similar to other sites, such as Rottenneighbor.com, a real estate tool discontinued in July 2009 that let people complain about barking dogs, overgrown lawns, loud pool parties and smelly garbage.

Notify Your Neighbors has a link near the top of each place page on the site. When users click on it, they get a simple form that lets them post a message. Once they’ve posted it, EveryBlock will publish it to each nearby neighborhood, ZIP and block page so other users can see it. It will also go out as an “announcement” in e-mail alerts and RSS feeds for the appropriate geographic areas.

Site founder Adrian Holovaty says he expects Notify Your Neighbors to get most of its traffic from items where people are “highly incented” to post. He’s guessing that missing pets will top the list, along with crime incidents. Garage rentals, missing mailboxes, water main flooding and community events are other likely topics.

“Use it for classifieds, use it to report local news, use it to ask questions or otherwise pass information to your neighbors … Use it for things we haven’t thought of! You can think of it as a 21st century community message board,” notes EveryBlock’s release.

In other site news, Holovaty says the six-person site has been redesigning its place pages to make them time sensitive. This would make them more of a real-time feed a la Twitter. Some things may be of immediate interest, such as the arrival of a taco truck.

The post EveryBlock Gets Social With ‘Notify Your Neighbors’ appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.