links for 2009-12-01

A few weeks ago, Paul Bradshaw approached a group of us in Brighton and Hove who'd signed up for his collaborative investigations site Help Me Investigate. He wanted to know if we would be interested in working together to make it take off here. Since then, I've been talking to people about it (mainly the editor and Mark Walker of SCIP, who I'm working with on their community reporters project) and yesterday, another email from Paul kick-started it into action.

Newspapers that underestimate the reach and audience of these sites are making a mistake – and overlooking the fact that their readership has freedom of choice, and a healthy case of scepticism about relationships between the 'local rag' (a term I particularly loathe) and the local council.