The neighborhood social app Nextdoor launches a redesigned version of its service that it calls “New Nextdoor”. The application adds local news, real -time alerts and a feature of AI called “Faves” designed to discover local businesses and points. Nextdoor has also updated its overall design to make it look more modern.
Started 15 years ago, Nextdoor has long served as a popular neighborhood talk platform, helping users to connect to things such as hydraulic recommendations and suggestions for nearby places to eat. But in the end, its growth ended up and the commitment declined as the platform was connected to positions containing misinformation and racism.
Now, the company is trying to turn things around and attract more users by making its platform more useful, useful and timely. With this redesign, Nextdoor is trying to increase the quality and quantity of local information on the platform, CEO and co -founder Nirav Tolia in TechCrunch said.
To bring news to its platform, Nextdoor has worked with 3,500 local publications in all the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Notable stores include the San Francisco model, the London model and the star of Toronto.
“The reason this is so important to us is historically. Nextdoor is 100% based on the content created by the user, only the content created by your neighbors,” Tolia said. “This was a great source of information, but to really make sure if it happens in your neighborhood, we must also bring local news.
Tolia said they are not commercial agreements, as Nextdoor does not pay for the content, nor do publishers pay the company. In addition, Nextdoor does not accommodate the content. It simply displays a title, an excerpt and a picture and directs the circulation to the publications. Users will be able to discuss the news in a commentary section under each post.
Tolia noted that publishers are only the first new type of content to come to Nextdoor, as the platform plans to allow small businesses, schools and organizations to have native presence in the future.
In terms of new alerts, Nextdoor is now showing real -time updates on things such as weather, traffic, power outages, storms and fires. These alerts will appear on a dynamic neighborhood map, allowing neighbors to have timely conversations about safety and readiness.
The service works with Samdesk and Weather.com, which includes the Weather Channel app and Weather.comto feed these notifications.
“When there is something that is definitely worth paying attention, we call the yellow state and we will put this alarm right on top,” Tolia said. “When there is something crucial, we call the red state and will take over the entire application, because at this point you are not interested in the neighbors that neighbors have.
Tolia noted that these notifications are over-applied because Nextdoor is built on a geographical platform. So, unlike the Amber notifications sent to everyone at a particular location, Nextdoor says it can personalize its home alerts. For example, if there is a power outage, the application will only send notice to people whose power is out.
As for the launch of Faves, Tolia reports that neighbors’ recommendations are more valuable than going to Google or Chatgpt when you are looking for a local restaurant or place to spend time with the family on the weekend, so the Nextdoor starts the feature. The new Faves features diligent recommendation lists and also allows you to ask specific questions to receive suggestions.
“We have an LLM for every neighborhood where we’ve got 15 years of neighborhood talks and now we can answer questions about this information in a truly exciting way,” Tolia said. “So we have the first, as far as we know, the first actual local AI to be fueled by neighboring conversations.”
Can you ask questions like “What is the best place for hiking with children?” and receive a quick, brief answer that draws information from real users to Nextdoor. Under the summary, you can see and click on the posts mentioned in the summary.
“This content is privately owned by Nextdoor,” Tolia said. “We have never shared it. It is not indexed by Google. It is not available in chatgpt again. Because we know where you live. We can target the information to you in the most relevant way.”
Tolia noted that the only value of Nextdoor is the digitization and recording of local words, the type of hyper-local information that is not available through platforms such as Google or Chatgpt, because you can only get it from direct conversations.
“I give the funny example. If you wanted to know all the lemonade kiosks that children work in your neighborhood. You can’t go to Google Maps and find it,” Tolia said. “You can’t go to Chatgpt and ask this question, so? The only way is to ask your neighbors and that’s why it’s the next Deardoor.
