The 23 community websites, all based in the South West of England, are being launched by Associated Northcliffe Digital, the digital publishing arm of Associated Newspapers and Northcliffe Media.

The new sites under the localpeople.co.uk brand will be designed to complement Northcliffe's existing thisis network of newspaper companion sites, but no journalists will be involved either in producing or moderating content.

Instead, the sites will be headed-up by community publishers whose role will be to act as "networkers," encouraging local people and organisations to submit their own material.

The sites typically cover areas with between 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants that do not have a dedicated local online proposition today.

Bidefordpeople.co.uk, Falmouthpeople.co.uk and Cliftonpeople.co.uk are among the sites being launched today, with a further 20-plus sites to be launched throughout the summer.

Roland Bryan, director of strategy at AND, said: "Our Local People Network has been developed to allow people who are living or working in local communities to interact with each other.

"The sites will complement the existing network of local and regional media and for the first time will create a genuinely user-generated approach to local content, giving local people an online forum to discuss and debate relevant issues with other locals, and shape opinion in their community.

"Our view is that while these sites are quite complementary to the thisis sites they are actually quite different. They are not news-led propositions, they are community-led propositions."

Like many social networking sites, the sites will employ a "reactive" system of post-moderation whereby users who object to particular content will be able to ask to have it removed.

The community publishers, who will be paid, have already been recruited.

AND hopes the new network will give local businesses fresh opportunities for highly-targeted advertising using both online display and business directory services, with users having the ability to rate and review businesses.