The Squeakerbox.com – Local Shows
Pirate Debs just turned me on to this site called TheSqueakerbox.com. It just started up, so the userbase is pretty small, and the look is a bit primitive, but it has a great concept. I think with a bit more development, this could really turn into something unique and very handy.
From thesqueakerbox:
I love music and I love going to shows. I also hate paying ticketmaster fees, but it’s much easier to find a ticketmaster show than it is to hear about a show at the bar down the street, and this frustrated me.
The idea of thesqueakerbox started forming when I thought, what if there was a place online where you could find local and indie shows as easily as you can find the big bands?
So I made one. Nothing too fancy, just local shows. Sign up, follow the bands that you like, and get an email when they add a show near you.
Basically, the site searches the artists’ MySpace account for upcoming dates and locations. For the band to get recognized, it has to have a MySpace account, from what I understand. You can search the Squeakerbox site based on your location via zip code, or based on a particular band you’re looking for.
If you don’t find the band you’re looking for on the text-heavy list of bands shown, you can click “add a band”. From there, the site prompts you for the bands’ MySpace page. After you select it, it shows you a list of upcoming shows, as well as adds the band to the list of bands on the Squeakerbox page. I like that, but there needs to be some sort of organizational element to search the existing bands already in the Squeakerbox database.
Second, and a really nifty feature, is that you can create your own Squeakerbox account. That allows you get email updates from Squeakerbox when your preselected bands announce a show near you.
What the site needs are a few things to make it really catch on:
1) As mentioned above, an easier way to manage/search/organize the myriad of bands in the database.
2) A genre filter to help you find artists based on a particular genre.
3) This one’s huge. If they built in a recommendation engine, the site would blow up. That way, the Squeakerbox would look at your account, figure out your favorite bands, and recommend bands with similar sounds that are playing near you. Even beyond that, imagine if the Squeakerbox could sync with your last.fm, Pandora, iMeem or MuxTape account to give you your favorite artists’ shows based on your most played or liked artists from those sites. Somebody get on that, because I just gave you a golden idea.
4) As of now, there’s no guarantee that you can bypass a TicketMaster or larger ticket outlet when using Squeakerbox. Sure you can find out about shows, but only some of the results link you up to the venue to buy tickets directly. A search engine should be developed to run through the net and show you where you can find the cheapest tickets to the gig. Imagine if you clicked on the show and it showed you Craigslist results for tickets to the show, TicketMaster prices, StubHub, iTickets, etc. Another advancement that would totally launch the site as something very unique and unmatched on other sites.
You’re sitting on a goldmine Trebek! I’ll let you develop it, just give me some kickback for the ideas.
Check out theSqueakerbox.com.
Tweet
Leave a Reply
