Local bias

[Dallen]

It is not tough to see that there is a clear bias towards the Utah running community on the blog. I am not necessarily saying this is a bad thing, but it could have negative effects depending on the objectives of the blog. I suspect that those bloggers without a connection to the area might feel a little out of place sometimes when much of the announcements, discussions and general vibe centers around Utah.

If the goal of the blog is to rapidly spread over the earth, this is an obstacle. If the goal is to be a local thing, then it is working very well. Alternatively it might just take over Utah and gradually move on to Idaho, then California and New York, ect.

Obviously this thing is Sasha's baby and he can do what he wants, but I wonder if separating it into a Utah-based and generic version might significantly speed up its growth. Eventually we could separate further into more local versions.

Just a thought.

[Paul Petersen]

Agreed.

[James Winzenz]

I tell you what, I would love to see race calendars for areas other than Utah.  Maybe that should be on a wish list . . .

[Adam R Wende]

I guess the question is how? I know there are many groups in other areas for example in Chicago (CARA). Also, it is hard because most of the addition is by word of mouth. It would be great to have "regional" FRB teams with separate sponsors. It is great that Steve supports as many runners as he does but the impact of his sponsorship does not return as much yield on someone from NY much less from someone even as close as from SLC as myself. I would suggest that if another area gets a critical mass, that this area selects a person to lead that areas group... However, as you've said Sasha holds the reigns on this one so we'll see what he replies. When I signed up I did it because I thought it was a "local" Utah thing so this whole "world domination" thing is kind of a shocker to me...

[Adam R Wende]

By the way, I don't think that the globalization of the blog is inherently a bad thing. I just agree that something should be done to help those outside the inner circle to feel like they belong "if" this is the direction the blog is going to go. I personally, only know of about 6 people on the blog that are even within a 30 minute drive of me that I check on regularly. The two people who's blogs that I comment on the most are in ID! The funny part is that before you (Dallen) posted this I was thinking even smaller instead of bigger. I always wanted to suggest a "cross town" classic of N-UT vs. S-UT at some road race. What do you say St. George you have what it takes?  Oh right, I guess you do. If you didn't before Friday you now certainly do with the acquisition of Logan...

[Dallen]

I think the blog will work great as either a local or large entity, although my understanding is that Sasha wants it to grow. I could be wrong.

I do think that if it grows too much it will lose much of its appeal to the locals.

[Scott Zincone]

Whenever I read a "mega-blog" it seems eventually the comments go from helpful and encouraging to insulting and degrading.  I hope this blog never gets to that point.  I think it was Paul Petersen who once said "this blog has heart."  We certainly do not ever want to lose that. 

[Adam R Wende]

Scott, Well said...

[Jon Allen]

Yes, very well said, Scott.  Bigger isn't necessarily better, at least in some views.

[Sasha Pachev]

I want the blog to get big and global, but maintain the same spirit. I think it is achievable. People will share positive comments when they are surrounded by positive comments even if they would have gotten negative in a different environment.

The reason we have only Utah race calendar is that Ted had time only for that. Yes, we are low on man power. It is a miracle we are even operational. Something needs to happen in the man power department, we need to find a way to generate revenue without becoming like Runner's World. I think it is possible, but we need to be patient. I am thinking about what Google has done. It took them a long time to come up with a revenue model, they first focused on making the best search engine. Once they had the best search engine the revenue model appeared naturally. In the same spirit, I want to see a site that takes a runner who thinks of himself as average and helps him run faster that he thought in his wildest dreams he could. If we could achieve that, the revenues will come and we will eventually be able to fix the cosmetics.

[Brice]

In the same spirit, I want to see a site that takes a runner who thinks of himself as average and helps him run faster that he thought in his wildest dreams he could. If we could achieve that, the revenues will come and we will eventually be able to fix the cosmetics.

Thats why I like the site, I definitely feel welcome and am very appreciative that such elite runners take time to look at my "average" training and help me feel like part of the group despite being hundreds of miles away.

[Jim Flowers]

Before joining this blog I setup my own blog using Blogger and tired to get some traffic by making comments on other running blogs.  After a couple of months I was probably getting one or two views a day and no feedback.  So joining the fastrunningblog was like a breath of fresh air.  As others have said this feels more like a community and it is great to be able to see what other runners are doing and to get feedback from them on your training.  As it gets bigger it might be helpful to be able to search for other bloggers by location, race times, etc so that you can find people in your area or people that have similar goals.

[Sasha Pachev]

You can already search by location. In a couple of days (hopefully) you should be able to search by goal type as well.