Yahoo Debuts New Rev of Local

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Yahoo Local has been getting better and better of late, and today Yahoo launched another rev of the service which I think comes close to redefining the idea of local from that of a search based application to that of a destination - no small feat, given all the mojo and investment inherent in the "local search" terminology. I spoke with Paul Levine, head of Yahoo Local Search, earlier in the week and he gave me a tour through the site's new features. What did I see that led me to this conclusion? Two things. One, a major commitment to the architecture of participation - Levine and Yahoo are committed to surfacing user-generated content wherever they can. And two, integration into the recombinant web - at one point Levine called Yahoo Local an emergent "collective wiki for local." I really like this idea - that of creating a platform based on a need (in this case local) - then letting the users build the service over time. While it clearly controls the dials and levers for now, Yahoo seems to be watching how folks are using the content and services they have integrated into local, then building (or rebuilding) the site as paths are laid down and choices are made by the users. Levine said he noticed that local searches were frustrating to many because they were often too broad - a search for "San Francisco pizza" or somesuch gave too many results. So Yahoo Local is now driven by the idea of "neighborhoods" for larger cities, a concept which informs and allows all sorts of new interface executions. It also has automatically generated "city pages" which surface the most popular content based on actions of local users. The whole deal is RSS friendly. Yahoo is leveraging its "buzz"...

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