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The Newly Launched So Saigon Website!

Welcome to the So Saigon website. While the site was only launched at the end of February 2008, it has been a long time coming. So Saigon is the sister site of The New Hanoian, a site that has clearly established itself as the premier English language website for those calling Hanoi home. It is also a project of Xemzi Limited of Hong Kong, an information technology company dedicated to bringing a hyper-local touch to the web resources of cities throughout East Asia. Xemzi supported sites are always locally managed and operated under the premise that nobody has a better grasp of what goes into making a city great than the people who live there.

A city like Saigon deserves top notch web resources that not only reflect the immense diversity of things happening here, but also that give those who know the city best the opportunity to ensure that it never falls behind the times. You, more than anyone else, are the best source of information on what is and isn't worth checking out in Saigon. Many other listings sites, online travel guides, and web magazines make a valiant effort to keep up with the changes all around, but Vietnam in the 21st century can make the most carefully crafted portrayal obsolete in a matter of weeks. Only the eyes, ears, and voices of an entire community can do a place like Saigon justice.

On the www.so-saigon.com pages, you will find all the tools you need to settle in Saigon and pass on your valuable insights to those who might benefit from those experiences. This information will take a variety of forms. User Reviews are one of the backbones of our site. We go to great lengths to bring you a vast directory of Saigon businesses and organizations that you can in turn tell people about your experiences with. In turn, we don't for a second think that we've found anything close to everything in Saigon that you might find interesting. You too will have the opportunity to enter any New Spot that you feel the community would find of interest. Upon entering it, we'll visit and verify the basic contact information and location that you have posted. From there, it's up to the community to decide just where that place will fit into the Saigon scene. We stay out of the recommendations business. That will be entirely up to you. As the reviews accumulate, you'll find the collected wisdom of the city summarized in the rankings on our Top Spots page. To better understand what goes into a valuable user contribution in this format, please visit the User Guide.

The members of our community will also be able to give each other the inside scoop on all that happens through the Ask So Saigon (Ask Sos) pages. This is an open question and answer forum where the collective wisdom of your trial and error can find a concrete home. When you've got a question about the who, how, when, where, or why of life in Saigon, check here first. If somebody hasn't addressed the issue yet, ask the community and watch the insights come flooding out.

Finally, as informative as So Saigon will soon prove to be, its most exciting potential is in how it can bring people together who might not have otherwise met. In the course of writing reviews and answering or asking questions, the unique perspective of each community member will reveal itself. When it becomes clear to you that some of the site users have a take on Saigon that you value, you can take the next steps to make these people a greater part of your online and (possibly) your offline life in Saigon. If you see someone who has a great take on this city, you can join their "following". What this will do is allow the site to update you on all future posts they make. If you're interested in further contact with them, our built-in private messaging system allow system you to make direct contact with them within the functionality of the site. If a group of users clearly have shared interests that they would like to pursue offline, any site member can create a "Group" that will be publicly listed. These groups can be used to draw attention to events and activities throughout the city. Any group member can post notices to the group page, send messages to the entire group, or post events that are being organized to the event calendar. Keep on the pulse of the city and show the world what Saigon is all about.

Add to all this our free Classifieds, Housing, and Jobs sections that any community member can post to, and you've got the single most powerful web tool for anyone who calls Saigon home. Watching So Saigon develop will be a treat for all of us. As a web experience in its own right, it will be a blast. However, there's much more happening here. In a city of such constant change as Saigon, we all have an opportunity to be a part of the very cultural mapping of this emerging metropolis.

Of course, at this point, you're probably wondering, "How does So Saigon make money?" It's an important question. We started this whole project out of a sincere interest in understanding the cities we have come to call home and in how modern web resources could be used to further that understanding. However, if we are fully to devote ourselves to the project, it has to support everyone who makes this possible. Accordingly, we have devised a business model that will make this possible without undermining our dedication to provide accurate information uncompromised by commercial interests. As interest in So Saigon increases, we will provide businesses small and large with a sophisticated method of informing the consuming public about their products and services that reflects the expressed values of our community members. Businesses will never have to pay to appear on the site. Provided that they are responsible in their use, all are welcome. What we will never do, is reveal your personal information or allow businesses to censor, edit, or distort the perspectives that you have added to this site. Some traditional banner style ads may appear on the site, but only for non-logged in visitors to www.so-saigon.com. If you are a registered community member who is logged into the site, they will not appear on the site for you. To be frank, banner ads play a very, very small part of what we have in mind. Rather, businesses will be community members much the same as you. While they may have some additional commercial features they can make use of, it will be up to them to be responsible contributors to this platform. Any abuse of that will only gain them your ire, and possibly get them banned from the site.

We look forward to your participation on So Saigon in these exciting times. If you have any questions or feedback for us, please don't hesitate to send us a message.

Cheers,
The Staff of So Saigon

Written by alpha

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