Big apologies to all our Into the Mountain regular readers who have noticed that David and I have been somewhat missing-in-action from our blog for the past couple of months. Life took us off on a bit of a detour and we’ve executed a home/office move in that time off air. I’m happy to say that things are now settling down and we’re getting into the rhythm of our new place.
2010 has been an interesting one so far for us. We burst back from the summer holiday period in January this year and had decided that we’d launch a venture we’ve been cooking up in a relatively low key way with our friend and entrepreneurial colleague, Ed Dowling. The constraints we’ve worked with are that both David and Ed work full-time on consulting and contract work and therefore can only offer up snippets of hours here and there when working on the technology of this new venture. Even so, they’ve done magic and I’m happy to say that we’ll be launching this new venture, RushCrowds this month.
RushCrowds will be in beta mode for the first bit of 2011 and we’re issuing an invite to any small arts/event companies in Melbourne who have shows on over summer who’d like to test the technology with us, to get in touch. If that’s your company, contact me via the comments section at the bottom of this post.
So what’s RushCrowds all about? Firstly let me tell you the story of how the idea and the group that is David, myself and Ed came into being. In April 2009 I attended a tweet-up in Melbourne run by Sam Mutimer and one of the people there was Ed. We were introduced, chatted and he casually ran an idea past me that was actually identical to an idea David and I had had in 1999 which we called back then, Arts Rush. In fact we’d written a business plan for Arts Rush, in addition to a couple of other plans and ideas, one of which was to become Arts Hub.
What made us not pursue the Arts Rush idea in 1999? Well we didn’t have a vehicle to talk to a large audience quickly to let them know about a deep discount, last minute only offer on arts tickets. We knew that we couldn’t afford mainstream media and even if we could we doubted that the cost-effort equation would work out. Ultimately what we did was refocus our intention on the industry side of the arts and so we created an online community and jobs and news product for arts industry folk, that was Arts Hub.
But by 2009 we had Facebook and Twitter and ways of talking to multiple small audiences quickly. Ed was the smart cookie who realized that Twitter was a perfect vehicle to distribute an arts discount ticket offer through. Lots of people claim they’d like to go to more arts events, but usually don’t. There can be lots of reasons for this, but for me it usually is that I don’t want to have to be that organized to look out there, figure out what’s hip and happening and then go and organize an evening out, weeks or even months ahead. From time-to-time I’d just like to rock up and experience whatever’s being presented and if it doesn’t cost too much, then even if I don’t like the show, I’m still appreciating the fact that I’ve had this experience and it hasn’t cost me a fortune.
RushCrowds iphone app
I must admit David and I had a brilliant period when we were growing Arts Hub when we had hit all the arts companies radars and were offered free tickets to just about every show that was being presented in Melbourne. Even though Arts Hub at the time was strictly for industry only and we didn’t run reviews, companies still wanted the Arts Hub staff and founders to go to their shows. I guess I really enjoyed going to shows I had no or very little knowledge about and because the ticket was free I didn’t mind stumping up for a babysitter and the other costs that go with a night out when you have children. These days we no longer get free tickets, however at least once a month I still have an urge to go see something different, something that will expand my mind, present reality in a way I haven’t imagined before and otherwise shake me up out of my set viewpoints and beliefs. RushCrowds I hope can serve that function for me and everyone else who gets involved.
How cool is it to grab yourself a couple of tickets to a show at the Malthouse, or Sydney Theatre Company or The Fillmore in San Francisco at a discount of 50% or better for a show that’s on that night? I think the magic in this concept is in immediacy and that it’s about doing something tonight or right now, rather than scheduling an entertainment option for next week or next month. It’s about allowing the element of surprise and discovery to take a role in what arts events we get out and about to see.
I know that our very wonderful Melbourne Festival and Melbourne Fringe and other arts festivals around the world do this incredibly well every year, however they’re only available for a very small portion of the year and we’re hoping that by being able to make unsold tickets available at a deep discount at the last minute only on RushCrowds that we’ll encourage a ‘let’s try this’ attitude in the general population.
Anyway, it’s been a while coming and I must admit Ed, David and I have squeezed this among the other things we do to keep ourselves afloat, so RushCrowds has been pretty organic in getting going, but it’s something we all really believe in. That getting more people (especially more who don’t usually do this) to arts events is a good thing. It’s good for the artmakers – a full house is a beautiful thing; it’s good for the punters (trying something new and unknown is exciting); it’s good for the arts sector (fully employed actors, directors, stage managers are happy campers); it’s good for society (lots of people trying something new opens the mind).
RushCrowds will start on November 18. We’d love you to follow us and get on board the bus for this journey. The first RushCrowds city is Melbourne and you can follow us on Twitter at RushCrowdsMelb. Once RushCrowds gets its act together in Melbourne, we have 99 other arts cities in the world to get moving on. Stay tuned!
You can find out more about the business we did found instead of Arts Rush in 2000, Arts Hub and the adventure of getting started, growing and then selling the business in our book, Niche Content Millionaire.
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