This one goes out especially to writers and reporters doing stories on Eventful. :-)
Dear reporters: far too often I see Eventful described as follows: "Eventful, an event-planning site, etc."
I would like to take this opportunity to explain what event-planning is, and why Eventful is not, and never has been, an "event-planning" site.
What better source to turn to than Wikipedia, which, I am delighted to discover, has a clear definition of what event-planning is. So without further ado, here are the first four paragraph's of Wikipedia's entry on "event planning":
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Event planning is the process of planning a festival, ceremony, competition, party, or convention.
Event planning includes budgeting, establishing dates and alternate dates, selecting and reserving the event site, acquiring permits, and coordinating transportation and parking.
Event planning also includes some or all of the following, depending on the event: developing a theme or motif for the event, arranging for speakers and alternate speakers, coordinating location support (such as electricity and other utilities), arranging decor, tables, chairs, tents, event support and security, police, fire, portable toilets, parking, signage, emergency plans, health care professionals, and cleanup.
Event Planning is a relatively new career field. There is now training that helps one trying to break into the career field. There must be training for an event planner to handle all the pressure and work efficiently. This career deals with a lot of communication and organization aspects. There are many different names for an event planner such as a conference coordinator, a convention planner, a special event coordinator, and a meeting manager.
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In a nutshell, that's not Eventful. Indeed, that description inolves way too many atoms, and far too few bits. In other words, we are about information, not the physical "heavy lifting" of putting on actual events and dealing with all the logistical headaches. Nah. No worries about decor, tables, chairs, tents, let alone police, fire, portable toilets, and whatnot. We're geeks. We work with computers. :-)
So if Eventful is not, so I dare to claim, an "event planning site", what is it?
It's the best way on the Internet to discover, share, track, create, and demand events. Since day one, Eventful's mission has been, in three words, to "maximize event discovery", something that I felt the Internet had done a poor job doing in the years prior to a service like Eventful being available. "Event discovery" is the act of discovering events that are interesting and meaningful to you such that you want to go to them and hopefully do wind up going to them.
How does this act of discovery take place? By finding out what your friends are doing. By sharing what you're doing with your friends. By having the system recommend events to you based on your interests. By browsing through the site and discovering events you might never have heard of before. By joining groups whose members share an interest, and, together, all of you can find events related to that interest. This is what discovery is all about. It is very powerful.
So what about "share"? Sharing means taking those discoveries you've made, and telling others about them, that simple! Getting the word out. Making your discovery someone else's discovery, and so on, and so on.
What do I mean by "track"? I mean tracking things down -- having the system work on your behalf to automatically and regularly search for people and subjects you are interested in, and when it finds events that match those people and subjects, it lets you know in as much advance time as possible. Did you know that whenever you search Eventful, you can save the search results as an RSS or iCal feed, and then re-run those feeds any time you wish, to get fresh results? That's tracking. Did you know that you can save a search, give it a name, and have it listed in your My Eventful page, and tell the system how often you wish to receive email notifications whenever the system finds items that match your search terms? That is tracking. Did you know that you can use My Eventful's iTunes / Last.fm importing feature to instantly import all of your favorite musical artists, and then Eventful will email you whenever any of them announces they're coming to your town for a performance? That's very powerful tracking.
By "create" I mean two things -- first, simply posting new event listings on the site, either via our Add Event page or the Eventful API for the developers out there. Second, by using Eventful Demand to create a groundswell of interest and support for an event in your town that you and your fellow demanders really, really, really want to have happen. When events come about because of Eventful Demand, you can truly say that you've helped "create" them.
And finally, "demand" -- using our world-famous Eventful Demand service, unique on the Internet, you can connect to performers and get them to come to your town for an event, be it a concert, comedy show, political rally, interview, public appearance, speech, book signing, film screening, or whatever other type of event you wish. Ask, ask loudly enough, and you shall be surprised at how often you can receive . . .
So. Not "event-planning." When you see that in a published news story about Eventful, you know somebody has not done their homework. :-)
Meanwhile, invite your friends to come on in and together use Eventful, especially the My Eventful feature inside Eventful, to its fullest -- indeed, the very best way to get the most out of Eventful is when your friends use it too. That way, each of you doesn't have to do much to get all the recommendations and event discoveries from the others.
