And for the record, I won’t be offended in the slightest if you don’t follow me back!

I agree with you completely. Facebook is not built with artists in mind, and is quick to make changes to the aesthetics (the changes to the interface came about rather quickly) but haven’t found a way to listen in on the changes its users are looking for.

The one things missing from your message is event listings. I like to flag the ones I’m considering attending, and early on, I had to perform a search to find the details again once I’d responded to an invitaiton. It’s slightly better now, having your events listed along the right hand side, but inputting information for an event that lasts for a number of days with different times, like the run of a show, makes it difficult to track or even be aware that it’s still running if I didn’t go to opening night.

I’m currently developing what just may be the right solution to this problem.

It’s called Stagetrailers.ca and it’s being designed for live performing artists to be able to promote themselves and their performances using video, photos and text in a database that the general public can search and browse, and keep tabs on their favourite performers.

It’s not meant to replace Facebook. The use of pages or groups is still very useful and having to make fans migrate to a whole other system would be too much effort.

It’s meant to fill in the gaps from the current tools that artists currently use to promote, creating a space for live performers of all fields, theatre, dance, music, comedy, spoken word, and others that would be come a one stop shop for the show-going public.

And I smiled when I read your pricing model. The plan has always been to charge $20 for an event listing, from the time it’s posted to the time the show closes. There are also a few different options for performers to maintain a presence there year round.

There is still a bit of programming left to do, but it’s looking like Stagetrailers.ca will be ready for launch before the end of September.

And for those of you who are American performers, this is NOT a Canadians only site, it just happens to be where I’m based and a good starting point to start marketing. The site will be just as functional for our neighbours to the south!

Feel free to opt-in for information on the current landing page:

http://www.stagetrailers.ca

or join the Stagetrailers.ca group on facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=67417241807

If you’d like to ask for more information, please email us at:

stagetrailers@gmail.com

Brent