Overview: What is The Solent Metropolitan & Why?

The Solent Metropolitan is/will be:

• a reference to each citizen who lives in the Solent region
• a media outlet by and for those citizens: articles, data, positive but thought provoking opinion
• an events guide where organisers can login and publish their events in: arts, science, technology, business, infrastructure
• Not a duplication of already great media outlets. Open collaboration.
• a promotion of Solent, a proper noun, that can be internationally recognised without ambiguity
• a reference to all the villages, towns and cities adjacent to the Solent stretch of water and their local authorities
• cohesion between the two cities Portsmouth and Southampton, grown-up mutual championing and regard; success happens when you're in good company
• Apolitical - non-political.
• An independent, grass-roots project, not connected to any public sector organisation.
• Self-funded.
• Cross channel promotion, linking content, people and organisations and people. Think how the wonderful BBC cross promotes content: as powerful as that.
• Connector
• Co production
• Building community stories
• A think tank
• This site made & built locally and open source, like public interest sites are such as government. Not  built elsewhere, but HERE!
• Concept of cultural and industrial scenes, critical mass through landing pages for categories

There's room for several outlets championing the region.

What we add:

• A platform for giving visibility to events and progress for the across the Greater Solent: Southampton, Portsmouth, Fareham, Gosport, Eastleigh and IOW.
• Connecting those regions, getting people to work together
• A one-off. Not a clone of a platform used in other places.
• Indie grassroots platform.
• Give trusted local organisations a login to publish and update their events.
• Started by a local, open to collaboration to others with affinity to the region. Being local doesn't have minimum time of stay, fresh perspectives from elsewhere along with those immersed in the region over time equally welcome.
• Open to other platforms. Not to duplicate.
• Slow content. Not a fast moving news site. More a deeper look over time.
• Ideas for co-production. Active participation in events. For people in the Solent as well as visitors.