It became clear to me last week, after several email exchanges with a local merchant in Berkeley, that our community platform should treat commercial residents as if they were individual households.
Tad Laird who runs a hardware store in the Elmwood District explained that as part of a small group of merchants, he is looking for an easy way to communicate and coordinate. There seems to be no limit to the circumstances in which our software could help -- he gave several examples:
- roaming gangs of youths;
- counterfeit travelers checks;
- a robbery or vandalism;
- issues we need to weigh in on, such as the current situation with the City trying to take our public parking lot and turn it over to a private conrtractor for valet parking;
- communicate with the police, and have them communicate with us;
- if something happens in residential areas immediately surrounding us, we want to be good neighbors and inform others;
Tad indicated that he had set up Yahoo groups, but that it had been too difficult for a number of merchants to operate. I had the same problem with my neighbors who found MSN groups to be difficult. So we will broaden the scope of user base to include commercial residents as well.
Thanks Tad for sharing your insights.
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