I Have a Radical Idea: If Our Information Has Value, Maybe We Should Get Paid for It

Hear me out.

While doing my usual posting reach this morning, I came across a LinkedIn clip featuring Nextdoor CEO Nirav Tolia.outine

Apparently, Nirav is back on the podcast prowl.

Maybe it's because NXDR has been having a better stretch lately. Maybe not. I can't know the reason, so I'll leave that one alone.

But something Nirav said caught my attention.

He talked about Nextdoor having 16 years of local knowledge and using AI to package that information into something resembling a neighborhood version of ChatGPT. He emphasized that the information comes from real, verified neighbors and said:

“We have the distribution, we have the unique content.” LinkedIn

That's when a radical idea popped into my head.

What if the neighbors started thinking of that “unique content” as ours?

Who Created Those 16 Years of Local Knowledge?

Nextdoor built the platform.

I'll give them that.

They built the technology. They maintain the infrastructure. They developed the distribution. They attracted advertisers. They employ people. They have shareholders—including me—who expect the company to create value eventually

.

But who created those 16 years of neighborhood knowledge Nirav is talking about?

Neighbors did.

We wrote the restaurant recommendations.

We answered:

“Does anybody know a good plumber?”

We explained which mechanic we trusted.

We posted about missing dogs.

We recommended roofers.

We warned people about road closures.

We answered questions about neighborhoods.

We reviewed local businesses.

We told everyone where to find the best pizza.

We debated whether that sound was fireworks, gunshots, or somebody dropping a refrigerator.

And, of course, we conducted thousands upon thousands of neighborhood investigations into the most important issue facing America:

Whose dog left that poop?

😂

Individually, those posts may seem insignificant.

Collectively?

Apparently they're 16 years of unique local knowledge valuable enough to become part of Nextdoor's AI strategy.

Nextdoor itself describes its newer Ask experience as providing summarized recommendations from neighbors. Nextdoor

That changes the way I think about what neighbors are contributing.

Maybe We Should Take Our Information Back

I'm not suggesting people literally own every fact, recommendation, or conversation once it's posted online; the legal rights around platform content are governed by the service's terms and applicable law.

I'm talking about something different:

Recognizing the economic value of our participation.

If my recommendation helps create a dataset that makes Nextdoor more valuable, my recommendation has value.

If I spend five minutes answering another neighbor's question, my time has value.

If thousands—or millions—of neighbors do that repeatedly for years, the resulting body of information has enormous potential value.

That's essentially what makes a network like Nextdoor useful.

Without neighbors contributing information, what's left?

A very sophisticated map with advertisements.

Think About Market Research

Companies routinely pay people to participate in research.

Focus groups.

Consumer panels.

Product testing.

Surveys.

Interviews.

Why?

Because people's experiences, preferences, and opinions have value.

Someone asks:

“Which home insurance company do you use?”

That's data.

“Would you consider switching?”

Data.

“Who's the best plumber around here?”

Data.

“Which restaurant has the best burger?”

Data.

“Which contractor would you never hire again?”

Data.

When I participate in a formal market-research study, somebody may compensate me because my time and opinion are part of the product being created.

But when neighbors collectively produce years of incredibly specific hyperlocal information?

We call that engagement.

Interesting distinction.

Maybe There Should Be a Neighbor Dividend

Now we're getting radical.

What if platforms found ways to share some of the economic value created from user contributions?

It doesn't necessarily have to mean Nextdoor sends me $1.37 every time I recommend a Chinese restaurant.

Although I'm listening, Nirav.

😂

Imagine contribution credits.

Premium-feature credits.

Advertising credits for neighbors who own businesses.

Revenue-sharing pools for certain commercial uses of community-generated insights.

Opt-in research panels where neighbors are compensated when their responses are packaged into commercial research.

Or even a clearly defined rewards program recognizing people whose contributions consistently create useful information.are worth exploring.

Plenty of models

The principle is more interesting than any specific mechanism:

If community-generated knowledge becomes a commercial asset, should the community participate in the value it creates?

That's a conversation I'd love to have.

Because Nextdoor Is Monetizing the Network

There's nothing inherently wrong with that.

Nextdoor is a business.

I'm a shareholder. I want Nextdoor to make money.

Nextdoor sells advertising products to businesses and has expanded its commercial offerings over the years. Its newest small-business initiatives include free Business Pages and forthcoming feed participation, while Opportunity Alerts is explicitly a paid product that routes requests from verified neighbors to local service providers. Nextdoor

That's a business model.

But look at what's happening economically.

A neighbor asks:

“Does anybody know a good landscaper?”

The neighbor created the demand signal.

Other neighbors may create recommendations.

Nextdoor owns the platform where the interaction occurs.

And now a local service provider can pay Nextdoor for an opportunity to respond quickly to that demand. Nextdoor

Again, that's not inherently improper.

But it's certainly worth examining.

Because the small business is potentially paying.

The advertiser is paying.

Nextdoor is monetizing.

And the neighbors generating the underlying conversation?

They're providing the raw material.

So Who Is Squeezing Whom?

I've already provided plenty of feedback about what I see as Nextdoor increasingly squeezing small businesses for revenue.

To be fair, Nextdoor also provides free business tools, and the company says businesses can claim a Business Page at no cost. Nextdoor

But the company is simultaneously building more ways to monetize access to neighborhood demand.

Now Nirav is talking publicly about another incredibly valuable asset:

16 years of local knowledge.

Our knowledge.

Our conversations.

Our recommendations.

Our questions.

Our experiences.

Our time.

If Nextdoor's future AI products become more valuable because they can package years of neighbor-generated knowledge, I think neighbors have every right to ask:

What's our part of the value equation?

“We Have the Unique Content”

I keep coming back to that phrase.

“We have the unique content.” LinkedIn

From a corporate perspective, I understand exactly what Nirav means.

Nextdoor has accumulated something competitors can't easily recreate: years of geographically specific conversations from people connected to actual neighborhoods.

That's potentially a formidable competitive advantage.

But from the neighbor's side, I hear something else:

We created the unique content.

Nextdoor collected it.

Organized it.

Distributed it.

Stored it.

And now AI may make it dramatically easier to extract value from it.

That's why I think the conversation needs to evolve beyond:

“Isn't this a cool AI feature?”

It should also include:

Who created the knowledge?

How is it being used?

How transparent is that use?

Who benefits financially?

Should contributors share in any of that benefit?

Those are much more interesting questions.

Maybe Our Posts Aren’t Free Raw Material

For years, social media trained us to think the transaction was simple:

We get a free platform.

The platform gets our attention.

Advertisers pay for access to that attention.

Fair enough.

AI complicates that bargain.

Our contributions aren't merely something displayed between advertisements anymore.

Years of human conversations can become a knowledge base from which new products are created.

That's different.

And if platforms increasingly treat human-generated information as an asset that can power AI products, perhaps users should increasingly treat their contributions as assets too.

My time isn't worthless because I typed it into an app.

Neither is yours.

Here's My Radical Idea

Nextdoor wants authentic human knowledge.

Neighbors have it.

Nextdoor wants unique local content.

Neighbors create it.

Nextdoor wants businesses to pay to reach neighborhood demand.

Neighbors generate much of that demand.

Nextdoor wants AI to package years of community knowledge into something increasingly useful.

Neighbors spent 16 years building that knowledge base.

So perhaps the next evolution of the neighborhood network shouldn't simply be:

How can Nextdoor monetize neighbors more effectively?

Maybe it should also be:

How can neighbors participate in the value they're helping create?

Pay us for opt-in research.

Reward valuable contributions.

Create meaningful incentives.

Give people greater visibility and control over how their contributions feed commercial products.

Experiment with revenue sharing.

Treat neighbors not merely as users, but as participants in the economic ecosystem.

Because there's an uncomfortable irony in squeezing small businesses for more revenue while simultaneously discovering new ways to extract value from the knowledge neighbors contribute.

The AI Revolution Might Change More Than Search

Nirav may be right that Nextdoor possesses something enormously valuable in an AI world.

AI can summarize the internet.

But Nextdoor potentially has something different:

Hyperlocal human experience.

That's valuable.

Very valuable.

Which is exactly why neighbors should start thinking differently about it.

The next time an app asks:

“Can anyone recommend a good roofer?”

Maybe don't just think:

"I'll help my neighbor."

Think about this too:

I'm contributing another piece to a commercial knowledge network.

Helping your neighbor and understanding the economic value of your contribution aren't mutually exclusive.

Our information has value.

Our experiences have value.

Our recommendations have value.

And our time has value.

If Nextdoor's future is built on 16 years of knowledge from real neighbors, maybe the neighbors who created that knowledge deserve a seat at the table when its value is realized.

Now that would be a radical neighborhood conversation.

Read the continuing Nextdoor case study at NielFlamm.com/blog.