Sudbury Parents' Group

Sudbury Internet group links residents

by Carole LaMond                                                                 Thursday, May 24, 2007

A new internet service, just for Sudbury residents, enables people to communicate, collaborate and share information and media online.

Sudbury residents Kim and Bo Bennett launched the Sudbury iGrOOp (http://sudbury.igroop.com) as a way to help residents connect and talk online. Throught he online group, Bennett offers residents the opportunity to connect utilizing increasingly popular Web 2.0 technology, including message forums, voice chat, blogging, audio, video and photo sharing, an online calendar and more.

“Official sites are a great place for information, but the person who puts out the Web site puts out the information,” said Bo Bennett. “What’s different about iGrOOp is that the members contribute the content that build the site and adds value as opposed to one entity controlling the content.”

Communication is at the heart of iGrOOps, said Bo Bennett, and that includes personal applications such as sending audio/visual postcards to family or setting up a video chat with a group of friends as well as blogs and personal Web sites.

Kim Bennett, the administrator of the Sudbury site, is offering free membership to the first 100 people to become members in the service which is priced at $29 per year [inserted update: we are no longer charging membership -- the group is now sponsored by a single company]. The more people join the group, the better the quality and quantity of information on the site, said Bennett, who is also looking for administrators to help monitor and update information on the Sudbury iGrOOp.

“Once people join and start adding information it makes it more attractive for the other people to join,” said Kim Bennett. Kim Bennett stressed that iGrOOps is a member-based community and a permission-based community. Members are invited to join. Members choose a nickname, but are no anonymous, which influences the civility and thoughtfulness of personal postings. E-mail addresses are private.

“And it’s secure, it’s not something that can be picked up by hackers. I’ve been doing Internet security for the last 15 years – it’s all about privacy – and I do it well,” said Bo Bennett. “That was all taken into consideration when writing the software so that the people of Sudbury are protected.”

“The Sudbury iGrOOp can be a fun and empowering tool for us as residents,” said Kim Bennett, a 10-year Sudbury resident and mother of two. “I would love to see residents using the discussion forum, and holding live real-time Web chats to debate town issues. I’d love to see residents start their own blogs, and upload video clips from the high school play, and photos from events around town. I see this as a real way to get to know each other, stay informed, and build community.”

Sections for travel tips, household service recommendations, advice, discussions on local issues, and customized applications, such as e-mail notification of new postings, are easy to create.

“One of the goals for Sudbury iGrOOps is to create an administration team where different members of the iGrOOp are responsible for overseeing different applications,” said Bo Bennett.

Kim Bennett has entered information and calendars from various town organizations and the schools so that information is available on the iGrOOp for at-a-glance scheduling. “In other areas I’ve entered information just to get it started whether it’s photographs or reviews,” said Kim Bennett. “I’ve made my own monthly movie picks because we watch a lot of movies.”

Kim Bennett, 37, has extensive experience in marketing and graphic design. Bo Bennett, 35, is an entrepreneur who launched an Internet company and wrote a book on the experience called “A Year to Success”. He also bought and sold Boston Data Centers.

The general idea for iGrOOps came from Bo Bennett’s volunteer service designing a template-driven system for Toastmaster clubs. Today more than 50 percent of all Toastmaster clubs worldwide use Bo Bennett’s software. “I kept thinking how can we use this on a larger scale?” said Bo Bennett who realized the concept of iGrOOps could be used by businesses, clubs and private groups as a vital communication tool. “I was thinking on the lines of clubs, but groups is what this is about which makes it so much more broad.”

For more information about the Sudbury iGrOOp, visit http://sudbury.igroops.com For more information about iGrOOps LLC, please call 978-440-9300.