New York has always been a hub for people to gather and collect. Neighborhoods formed based on ethnic and social realities. Places are dubbed hot and cool often based on their cross streets. So much of New York is about how and why people get together. In the 1960’s, Greenwich Village erupted with the Folk Movement. While Bob Dylan and a handful of others may be the names that people remember, it in fact drew from a cast of thousands – all coming together for reasons that centered around one idea: folk music. It’s a simple concept – give people a place to enjoy their passions, and they will congregate. Yet, this simple concept is extremely hard to pull off.
The Roger Smith Hotel is pulling it off. On Twitter the other day, I called Brian Simpson of the Roger Smith the David Van Ronk of the New York Social Media scene. Van Ronk was dubbed the “Mayor of MacDougal street” and while “mayor” might have a different connotation in the social media world thanks to Foursquare, Brian has served many as a conventional one might. Brian has helped cultivate the Roger Smith to be the Social Media haven. The other night it culminated in having over 50+ people at the Roger Smith checking in on Foursquare. Brian was there, somewhat in the shadows, watching as multiple events that centered around Social Media took place. DigitalSomethings was upstairs. A Tweetup downstairs. Watching them mix and marry into an amorphous cloud of people, you can’t help but feel like something special is in the works.
Now, I’m new to town. I haven’t known the regulars in the Social Media scene here for that much time. I just know that the Roger Smith has a reputation from those in town, and a mythos to those out of town. It probably feels like what places like the Gaslight, Gerde’s, Cafe Wha? and the Folklore Center must have felt like to the folk crowd. As social media, mobile, and location based technology becomes motivation for offline events, what other venues and hubs will develop? The Roger Smith is one of the first ones that I discovered. I don’t need to keep track of check ins to see who is the “Mayor” of that place – and maybe even of this New York scene in general….
