Feedback wanted on a new Primal Resources Directory: please help! page

[jnestour]

Hello fellow primal goers,

I've just finished the very first release of a web platform I always wished existed: a directory listing the primal resources available to us all online but more importantly locally. Anyone can add the resources that they would recommend, and anyone can rate and review their quality. You can look at all the resources posted, those online, or those close to a geographic location.

I'm quoting below my blog post explaining the rationale behind this collaborative directory. I need you fellow primal goers to tell me if you think this is useful, what you like, what you don't like, and maybe even contribute! This is the alpha version, so things are not yet polished and the content is slowly building, but that will accelerate shortly.

If you can, please come have a look at http://healthylivingtribes.com and let me know what you think: ideally on the site's feedback module or on this thread :-)

Many thanks!

- Julien

In this first post on the Healthy Living Tribes blog, we'll look briefly at what this community aims to achieve and why we'll put a lot of efforts to ensure it takes off.

Healthy Living Tribes aims at being a free collaborative directory of local and online resources for the Paleo/Primal community (both words used interchangeably). It's that simple; but let's detail a bit:

free: well, let's get thta out of the way first. It's free, ever will be, we won't spam you or share your emails, yada, yada… We're not looking at scamming anyone, we just want to build something we always wished existed.

a directory of resources: no fluff, commercial spam or bullshit advice. We don't tell you what to eat/use/etc., but we aim at gathering the best places to do so, as recommended by the local paleo communities (or tribes ;-) ). All you will find here is concrete details, locations, reviews, etc. mostly entered by your peers. They are a lot of resources to learn the theory, we're focused on the concrete implementation at our individual level.

collaborative: anyone can create a page in the directory for something they would recommend to the whole paleo community (on the wiki model). Then anyone can rate and review those resources. As soon as we get to a small critical mass of users willing to contribute a bit of their expertise, we'll have a gem of knowledge available to all.

local and online: while most of us don't need any more info on nutrition, fitness, and the paleo lifestyle, we still find it hard to share the good tips and addresses in our respective areas. Advice about fresh food producers, healthcare practitioners, crossfit boxes, and so on are only relevant locally. We hope the platform we've built will serve to collect and share this local knowledge.

for the Paleo/Primal community: we all look for the same foods, of the same quality, look for the same offering in terms of fitness training. We are a community, and we can all gain a lot by sharing our practical knowledge and improving each others.

all that enabled by the best technologies available: let's use the best techs available and get a platform that's really efficient at sharing knowledge and keeping track of new resources listed that are relevant to us. We're confident you'll find the tools we've built efficient at both creating and benefiting from new knowledge.

Our motivation to build this platform was really simple: we just wanted something like it. In the past 10 years, we've lived in more than 12 locations in nearly as many countries. Let's just say that finding what we needed each time was a painful process. Here is what we want to achieve and why:

Make available localized resources

The Paleo/Primal blogosphere and books now provide an excellent set of information on the lifestyle. Yet, when you know that you want to eat grassfed meat, train with a trainer according to the primal principles (little cardio, high intensity, and so on); how do you find the places where you can actually purchase affordable grassfed meat that you trust, or find the trainers you can trust with their programming? This knowledge is highly local, and unless your paleo neighbor is blogging and you actually read her blog, you will have to spend time and efforts discovering your local places on your own.

We want to enable our community to share this local knowledge so that we can all spend more time living our lifestyle rather than spending time researching local food sources.

We're focused on pragmatic, concrete implementation

There are excellent sources of info about what to do, but less so on how to actually do it. We won't waste your time with yet again more of the same theories rehashed, you'll just find pure implementation resources. Why is that important? Let me take the example of my family. We've actually managed to convinced them to switch to a mainly Primal diet. They know what to do, we've taught them so. But they live in France, and we haven't actually live there for over 10 years, so we have absolutely no idea where to get grassfed meat, how it's labelled, what brands of supplements to trust…you get the idea. We cannot even research this stuff from Australia. But if experienced French paleos post their resources on the platform, then our folks will be able to go beyond the theory to the actual implementation much more quickly.

Mislabelled snake oil

An important reason for going granular in the review of resources is the constant mislabelling and misleading marketing of the whole food and supplements industries. Grassfed beef can be grain-finished for up to 90 days, many ingredients can be omitted in the labelling of supplements, "natural vanilla flavor" is often the resulting by-product of rice processing. Yet many producers and manufacturers strive for and achieve an awesome quality for their products. It's just hard to discover them. By enabling us, consumers, to promote these quality products within our community, we will benefit not only ourselves but also the people who strive to provide us with awesome stuff (I could kiss the farmer in Queensland who produces the only raw milk I find in Sydney!).

Some things need to be discussed locally

Do you have children? We just had our first daughter. Planning future daycare is an important task for every new parent, but if you'd like your child to avoid eating the garbage commonly given to children in daycare centers, this step just got a little harder. To find primal-friendly daycare or even to organize a nanny for a couple of paleo families, we need to connect, locally, within the Paleo community. There's just no other means to do this. This is just one example of the type of things we enable you to discuss in our local groups. We just think it's the most efficient way towards implementation for a number of important matters.

Now that you know the what and the why, the only question is: will you be part of this community? We all need each other, and while the Primal community undoubtedly grows larger everyday, we sure as hell could benefit from a more efficient way of structuring our knowledge. So jump in with us and get started here!

PS: and be indulgent, we're in alpha mode, so expect some bugs ;-)

[labmike]

That's pretty cool; looks a lot like my primaltribes.com website. What angle are you taking with this site? How much content are you going to do that's user-contributed?

[jnestour]

Thanks! Most of the content should be user-contributed, since the best resources are local and well, I only know those in the cities I've lived in ;-) But the search element needs to be really efficient to enable people to find what they want in 10 secs. The search will get tweaked even more shortly. I wasn't aware of your site, I'll look at it now!

[labmike]

Yes, location search and location data for content is key. Which CMS do you use? I know the bigger ones should have a drop-in module available.

[Crigiourf]

Hi, what about .


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[IvyBlue]

I do think that a compendium of local resources would be a good thing, especially health care providers. Nothing against chiropractors but the paleo directories I've found only list chiropractors.

I did just sign up. I notice that I gave you my city and state (Boston, Ma) yet when I'm clicking on the "local" I'm getting listings in Australia. As you reach a critical mass there should be some way to narrow that down.

I will add local providers as I find them but I find myself sourcing a lot on the web from providers you've already listed. For myself, the social media stuff doesn't interest me, MDA is enough. I may be one of the last 17 people on earth that don't have facebook or twitter.

[jnestour]

Hi IvyBlue, thanks for trying out the site! Yes, there is an over representation of Australian listings, as this was our first content. We're adding new listings quickly now, so we should reach a critical mass in the next couple of weeks.

The best way at present to get only the providers that are in your area is to use the search form available on the Directory page (Healthy Living Tribes - Pages Home) and just put your location as well as a range for a geographic search. We keep the location field empty and not tied to the location you provided us with, because people also want to search around vacation spots, business trips locations, etc.

I kept the Healthcare category pretty open, exactly for the reason you are mentioning :-)

Many thanks for registering and keep the feedback coming!

[jnestour]

Hi everyone,

A new version of this Paleo-Primal directory is now online. Still in progress but getting there fast.

Please give it a try at Healthy Living Tribes and as always, let me know what you think, as iterations are based on your feedback.

Oh, and if you share a resource or post a review of an existing one before the end of November, you'll also enter a draw to win Mark's latest book :-)

Thanks for your help!

Best,
- Julien

[PotterPan]

This is a very good speech, I think it is a positive idea, need quick reply.