By NYU Staff

As local newspapers wither away, AOL is positioning itself as the go-to source for local communities. Its main vehicle is Patch.com, a collection of sites with a local focus that AOL acquired in June.

The sites, each operating under a single editor, offer local news and sports, restaurant offerings, and events in towns with populations of 15,000 to 50,000. AOL operates 25 Patch sites and plans to have hundreds more in the next year. The idea is to lure national advertisers keen to reach local consumers.

Not surprisingly, it has been harder to figure out the business model for all of this. An explosion of interest among local merchants in advertising on hyperlocal sites has been just around the corner for a number of years now. So far, advertisers are mostly local, such as colleges, arts centers and florists.

Many sites — from big corporate undertakings like Patch.com to small businesses like Baristanet or Thealternativepress.com, to name a couple of New York-area hyperlocal efforts — are counting on local advertising to support local journalism. Some are getting more traction than others. Other sites, including Topix, a venture by McClatchy Co., Gannett Co., and Tribune Co., are vying for that market.