The BC Universe: Crisis on Infinite Earths

This month, we reached 4,000 followers on Twitter, which means it's time for another snapshot of how you use Brockley Central in its various guises.

Since December, we've increased our daily reach from approximately 7,000 to around 9,000, mainly driven by the continuing rapid growth of Twitter, but also thanks to steady growth across all the other channels and the addition of Pinterest. On Facebook, we're still skewing towards women and the 25-44 year-old demographic, with the gender bias becoming more pronounced, while the age profile broadens a little.

It's been interesting to see how the different channels have taken on lives of their own. For example, on Twitter some people have taken to using @brockleycentral like a hashtag for their location ("On my way to meet friends @brockleycentral"), while Facebook serves as a forum for some people (recent posts include updates from Gulens, ads for flats and someone looking for a stolen van). Meanwhile, our actual forum serves as a sober alternative to the furious discussions that take place on the blog and even the quietest local sections (Ladywell, Catford and Lewisham) generate new conversations on a weekly basis.

To be sure, there's a lot of double and triple counting going on with the cumulative reach figure, as people follow BC across a range of channels, but when we began adding it all up last June, the total figure was less than 5,000. Our mission to make this the best-connected part of London continues...