Austinist’s Interactive Guide to SXSW

Last night, we launched our SXSW Interactive Guide over at the Austinist. This project has been a baby of Allen and I’s for weeks, after a really exciting conversation with the nice folks at Eventful got us motivated to try and tackle the problem of organization and planning during SXSW.

We thought that there needed to be a way to filter information easily instead of being forced to pour through list after list of crud. The amount of information and the sheer magnitude of things to do that week is brutal if you don’t have a meaningful way of organizing it, and we wanted to figure out a way to not only give people an easy way to find out what is happening when, but locate it and schedule it all in the same place.

Here’s what you can do so far:

* View what parties we’re excited about, arranged by day. Our database includes bands performing, times, whether the party is open to the public or requires an RSVP, and more.
* Quickly and easily see what parties are close to one another, and where everything will be in general. It’s important to know if a party or showcase is within stumbling distance of another, if you ask us.
* Get text reminders by adding an event to your Google Calendar. Simply click on the button, and the rest is taken care of! We strongly advise that you set up a Google Calendar if you haven’t already.
* Take a closer look at all of the nifty flyer artwork, by clicking on the button where available
* Catch up on recent and past coverage that Austinist has done on SXSW. We want it to be super easy for you to access our profiles and interviews with showcasing bands like Architecture in Helsinki, Sondre Lerche, YACHT and more.

In the next week or so, we’ll be adding these features and more:

* SXSW showcase information. Thanks to the lovely folks over at Eventful.com, we’ll be able to point out a dozen or two of the really good showcases going on each night that we think you oughta check out.
* Breakfast Taco and BBQ indicators, so you can quickly spot where to get your next brisket and/or eggs-and-chorizo fix.

I highly encourage you to take a look at it if you’re planning to be in town that week, and bookmark it, since we’ll be updating it regularly as more information becomes available.

Google calendars are for cheap nerd wannabes and wimps. What a useless “tool” for those too cheap to purchase Outlook. Or a Blackberry. Google should stick to searching.

I lurve it! Great job, Paige and Austinistas.

Dale:

I dunno, I thought it was pretty rad that you could get txt alerts — not everyone has a Blackberry, but almost everyone has a cell phone. It’s definitely the most widely used way to send a quick message or reminder, since we assume people will be out doing fun things, not sitting at home refreshing a schedule online.

omit:

thank you!

Sorry, I thought you knew. I was talking about Outlook and how you could use it (and syncs) on all platforms: desk, laptop, Blackberry, Palm Treo, plus a myriad of Windows Mobile devices out there. Outlook and really any email client can send messages to any mobile phone with the right calling plan. It’s not unique to google.

This might be a good site for you if you are doing any sort of websurfing on your cell phone - significantly improves speed and reduces bandwidth:
http://www.iyhy.com/

First off - awesome idea / implementation. You better believe I’ll be using this in the next few weeks to decide my schedule.

Helpful (hopefully) feedback - doesn’t seem to work in Safari. At least it didn’t for me. Granted, that’s like a 2% market share but just a heads up. Looks great in Firefox.

If it was at all possible to get a few of the bands listed in the Google Map that would be great. I just started clicking around in the map without looking underneath it and thought “okay, so something cool is going on at Longbranch Inn but who is playing??” Had It said “Damage Pants, Happy Families, and more!” I would have gotten an idea of what to expect there. Or maybe just an anchor link to the info found down below?

But please don’t take this as overly negative feedback - this thing is GREAT. I can’t wait to see more.

Nashville bands that I know of so far: How I Became the Bomb (Wed - Maggie Maes) and De Novo Dahl (3 or 4 shows apparently - majority being day shows.. Filter stage maybe).

Again, great work!

I’m with Dale, fuck this Google shit Paige, just buy everyone coming to SXSW a Blackberry and Outlook.

“ur in my Google, being a loser wannabe wimp.”