Coolness quotient for cities based on blogs, craigslist, Upcoming, and Meetup

Rob Goodspeed correlates creativity and online culture on his blog (On "Cool Cities" and Blogs):

My theory: cities with the richest local online culture (measured in number of blogs, and use of a select group of other geographically-bound websites) will reflect those cities with the highest numbers of creative class people.

He also notes that as a critical mass of people become able to present themselves online, the old idea that the Internet inherently transcends geography is now complemented by a proliferation of local, neighborhood-centered groupings.

Although the internet was initially treated as a global affair, limited only by language (and perhaps not even that), recently geographic logic has emerged in the medium. New technologies have allowed for a flowering of locally-based online communities.

This has been made possible both by an increase in the size and use of the internet, but also by new technologies which make it easier to generate webpages. One of the most important developments was a variety of software programs which enabled people to create weblogs with little to no specialized technical skills. Blogs have lowered the barrier for more than an elite participation in creating content for the web.

(via Waxy Links)