Why Spot.Us Should have used Drupal (and why it doesn't matter)

It's the one that got away. With many Knight News Challenge projects using Drupal, the dedicated Knight Drupal Initiative (reopening after DrupalCon in March), and Drupal sites for the Knight Foundation's own community, David Cohn must just be deficient in groupthink to have chosen to develop Spot.Us in Ruby on Rails.

Despite my bias, the "Why Spot.Us should have used Drupal" title is tongue in cheek. I'm pretty sure David Cohn (who is smarter, better looking, and always better dressed than me) and the Spot.Us development team will get the following enhancements in place quickly. Especially since, when it comes to winning friends and influencing people there is nothing like a polite, personal, respectful, and massively cross-posted note (but hey, I couldn't find an issue queue).

For what it's worth, here's the list of features that the Spot.Us site lacks that would be automatically or easily provided by a Drupal-based framework:

• Instant login when registering (LoginToboggan)
• Better workflow when registering in general: Currently, you are left on the registration screen after registering, and clicking on the "check your e-mail message" happens to lead to a 404 file not found error (featuring LOLcats, so it's worth registering just to see this.
• One-click e-mail confirmation instead of cut-and-paste your temporary password (Drupal core functionality)
• Ability to be alerted when pitches are added to selected categories (core Taxonomy module and Notifications). Update: The site has categories, but despite signing up as interested in everything I've yet to receive notice of anything.
• Donations to the site in general, not just specific pitches (ECommerce or Ubercart. These could be added as matching funds to others' donations. (Lots of traffic was generated in news articles about the site, and people enthusiastic about the idea with no stories matching their interests should have been able to donate, indeed set up recurring donations, to support the site and the stories chosen by others).
• Integration with other Drupal sites. Not really automatic, but if written by Drupalers there would already be a Spot.Us Drupal module (and probably a Wordpress plugin and a generic drop-in widget) for sites with a stake in a pitch on Spot.Us to solicit donations to that pitch. Drupal sites like the Bay Area's Public Press or, on the other side of the country, Open Media Boston, could pull information from Spot.Us and have one click to get their readers and members involved in crowd-funding a story.
• RSS feeds! Also related to promotion, a Drupal Spot.Us would have built-in RSS for listing of tips and pitches and every category.
• Turn-key local Spot.Us groups (Organic Groups). Instead of only encouraging other people to download the free software (though that is great), Spot.us could allow selected people to curate or manage regional editions beyond California's Bay Area. (Furthermore, people who do install the software themselves could draw on the huge Drupal ecosystem of modules to plug in all this functionality and much more.)

There, I hope that's lit a fire under some Ruby/Rails folk! Now, with all that said – and with only the dedicated few still reading – here's the real point of this post:

None of the above matters.

Just as the code language (PHP) and even quality of Drupal is secondary to its amazing community, the technology of Spot.Us is a distant second in importance to its passion, purpose, and the energy that flows from its reason for being.

As readers of IdeaLab know, Dave launched this thing with a wiki (oh, and a Drupal site of about three pages, which was undoubtedly the critical factor in Spot.Us' success).

Technology can certainly help or hinder the development of community — that is, after all, the premise of the Knight News Challenge — but tools matter far less than a sense of purpose and a drive to see it through.

Of ideas whose time has come, community-funded reporting is definitely one. Please, just to spite me, go make Spot.Us a resounding success without a drop of Drupal. The new breed of local, independent, and smart news sites it will help flourish are as likely as not to be built in Drupal anyway!