Apps Helping Art and Music Festival-Goers Stay Connected
When thousands of revelers descended upon Black Rock City for the annual Burning Man festival, a gathering of artists, musicians and creatives, there was a new addition: an iPhone app.
The official app of Burning Man, iBurn 2010, provided festival attendees with a downloadable list of events that was accessible offline, due to the spotty WiFi available in the desert where the festival is held. It also allowed attendees to locate themselves on a map of the camp, something that made navigating the large city that is erected during the festival much easier. Because Burning Man puts an emphasis on community and connection, this app seemed like a natural addition to the festival lineup.
Burning Man was not the first festival to use an app to improve the experience of it’s attendees. Coachella Arts and Music Festival released a similar app before their festival this year, including a feature that allowed people to locate their friends using GPS. It also allowed users to compile a set schedule of bands they wanted to see using a feature they called Coachooser, which could be done on a computer and then downloaded into the iPhone, making it easy for attendees to create a schedule of shows they don’t want to miss, something that can be tricky when relying on a paper schedule distributed the day of the festival. Users could also share their schedule with friends, making it even easier to connect.
Lollapalooza also followed suit with a unique app that included GPS locating and utilized users Facebook profiles to have them log-in, select friends they’d like to connect with, creating a news feed based off of those friends updates within the Lollapalooza app. They also enabled users to post photos and updates to Facebook and Twitter from within the app. Another unique feature was Lolla Radio, which gave attendees the chance to preview the lineup of artists for free prior to the festival. A cheeky touch included a lighter screen, for those who wanted to show their appreciation for a great show, sans actual lighter.
The appeal of so many of these festivals goes far beyond the music or art, and extends into the friends and connections made during the experience. These apps enrich the experience for the community as a whole, mostly because it allows friends to connect in a brand new way that’s accessible to them. People love to connect, and these apps make that happen. These apps embody the “social” in social media, and I believe we’ll be seeing more and more apps emerge in this field.
Next time you’re heading to an arts event, run a quick search to see whether there is an app to support your experience.
