ABOUT

What is “local knowledge”?

When “locals” have knowledge that is of interest and value to others, it is referred to as “local knowledge”. However, this knowledge is not always shared or freely accessible, either because it's simply a part of their “community”, or because it provides them with an advantage.

In the online world, local knowledge is hidden or buried in the "deep” Web beyond the reach of conventional search engines. Depending on whom you ask, this buried content is estimated to be as much as 500 times larger than the Surface Web, which is conservatively estimated to be at least twenty billion pages. If major search engines index only Surface Web content, then they miss billions of pages of content buried in the Deep Web.

What is Local Knowledge Online (www.localko.com)?

Where knowledge workers, scientists, engineers, business and information professionals go to search, discover, preview, buy and subscribe to eBooks and eReference they don’t know about or cannot access, either because these resources are not a part of their “community” or because they have not been granted access.

Leadership

Kevin Cronin is an entrepreneur and eBook pioneer that founded Local Knowledge Online in 2005. Kevin has more than 25 years of experience in the information industry with a proven ability to build innovative new businesses.

As ebrary’s first Vice President of Sales, Kevin led the company’s successful entry into the academic library market and established the company as the leading provider of eBook databases in this market.

During the mid-1990s he was a pioneering sales executive with CBT Systems (renamed SmartForce, merged with SkillSoft) and experienced first hand the evolution and growth of the eLearning industry.

Kevin is a co-founder and current board member of The Dante Benedetti Foundation. He is a graduate of the University of San Francisco where he earned a BS in Business Administration.