Hyperlocal is nothing new - let's get hyperpersonal

Hyperlocal is an ugly word. And yet it is regularly used in discussions about journalism on what we used to call the Worldwide Web. If local is good, then hyperlocal - according to digital newspeak - must be doubleplusgood.

Coined in the early 1990s in the context of cable television in the United States, this neologism has outlived its usefulness. It is neither helpful nor appropriate.

Back when local newspapers were at the heart of their communities and local knowledge was a requirement for any aspiring journalist, I enjoyed a formative stint as the Normanton reporter for the Wakefield Express Loading... companies wakefield-express . I was single-handedly responsible for gathering as much news as possible from a small West Yorkshire mining town of fewer than 19,000 people. I still remember the week in which I broke the previous record and filled six pages.

Much of this was collected, literally, from individuals active in the local community: the vicar, the priest, the chairman of the Rotary Club, the organizer of the Tuesday Club for pensioners, and so on.

At worst, these would make a "village par", a single-paragraph snippet; at best, they might merit a downpage article. Page-leads came from straightforward on-the-ground reporting: the town council, the outlying parish councils, the police station and magistrates' court. Some came from letters or telephone calls from readers.

But the best came as the result of face-to-face conversations with contacts: people whose trust was won - and whose tongues were loosened - in the beery atmosphere of pubs and clubs, frequently at personal expense (both to wallet and to health).

I can't remember the circulation figures for the Normanton edition; maybe I was never told. But I'm pretty sure it was in the hundreds rather than thousands. The same was true for the two other "district" editions.

That was 1980. Even by today's standards, that was hyperlocal - long before the word had even been invented: a substantial amount of relevant content, much of it user-generated, produced by networked journalists in direct two-way contact with the communities they served.

So why is the word now in vogue?

One reason relates to the shrinking to near-extinction of genuinely local newspapers. The number of editions has been reduced, often with a single edition - even of daily newspapers - seeking to cover a vast geographical area. At the same time, reduced resources mean more superficial coverage.

As a result, content is thinner, less timely, and less geographically relevant. Few newspapers earn the right to describe themselves as local. It is even more laughable for a television channel to describe itself as local when it broadcasts - in my area, for example - to homes west of Bournemouth, north of Oxford, and east of Dover.

Perhaps those involved in "hyperlocal journalism" should forget the hype and assert ownership of the simple word "local".

But what does 'local' mean these days

In a pre-digital age, it was understandable why printed newspapers served defined circulation areas that met the needs of relatively static, self-defining communities whose members - generation upon generation - lived, laboured and leisured in the same geographical locality.

This is no longer the case. Locality is a much more flexible and fluid concept for someone who may move home, change job, or travel farther afield for work or pleasure.

For most people, physical location remains an important factor in real-world social existence and engagement . But an increasing number of individuals wish to define and continuously re-define what is local to them in a variety of personal contexts, of which physical location is only one.

In sum: the future is not hyperlocal; the future is hyperpersonal.

Greg Hadfield, a former Fleet Street journalist and internet entrepreneur, is director of strategic projects at Cogapp, an award-winning digital agency.