Spoiler Alert: I’ve concluded the Ultimate Festival App still doesn’t exist. That conclusion might surprise you since Joobili recently launched its Sziget Festival App for one of Europe’s biggest music festivals. Don’t get me wrong, our festival apps have a lot of cool features and we plan to add even more. But we still haven’t built the ultimate festival app…yet. The good news is nobody else has either.
So what exactly is the ultimate festival app you ask? I think you start by pulling bits and pieces of existing festival apps that are really well done. The ultimate festival app needs to have the right mix of Information, Simplicity, Interaction, and Fun.
Information: At its most basic level, the festival app must replace the paper program booklet we all hate carrying around. In addition to performer and venue listings it should take advantage of the digital medium and include plenty of photos and videos. The Cannes Film Festival App is a good example of rich information packed into a festival app.
Simplicity: The danger with all this information in the palm of your hand is that it becomes overwhelming and confusing if the user interface is not intuitive. Believe me, simplifying all this information into a festival app is no easy challenge.
Interaction: This is where festival apps have a real opportunity to dramatically enhance your experience. The Glastonbury App by Orange offers a nice augmented reality experience. Joobili’s new Sziget Festival App increases interactivity by helping festival goers connect with friends within the festival and those beyond the festival gates via twitter, facebook, etc.
Fun: We go to festivals to let loose and have fun and this element is sometimes lost in our search for the perfect digital program guide. I’ve seen fun features like tent-finders, strobe lights and alcohol tests. My personal favorite is the encore flame included in the French Quarter Festival App.
In addition to the criteria above, the ultimate festival app must do one more thing. It must have a business benefit to offset the cost of developing it. This could be revenue from sponsorships, paid apps or in the case of free apps it could be user registrations and brand awareness. The point is that festival apps are not just fun toys, they are an increasingly important part of the festival experience (especially with mobile ticketing on the horizon).
Judging by the flood of festival apps that launched in 2010 it won’t be long before we are closer to the ultimate festival app. Until then, we’ll keep improving on what we’ve got.
With the summer festival season well underway, it’s time to pack the tent, put on your shorts and wellies and MAKE SOME NOOOOISE! Britain is home to an overwhelming selection of summer music festival fun so picking just 10 Britain Summer Music Festivals was painfully difficult. We opted for a good mix of mass madness, relaxing chillout and something in between. Have a peek at Joobili’s selections and then cast your VOTE HERE to help us select the best of the best. Did we miss a Top 10 worthy music festival? Let us know.
Summer is here and you’re already planning your seaside escape. It won’t be long before you’re breathing the sea breeze and sipping cocktails while working on your seriously neglected tan. Could it get any better than this? Actually, yes, it can.
Here at camp Joobili we believe a good festival or unique event can improve any travel experience, even a beach holiday. So we’ve collected a list of Super Summer Seaside Festivals where you can have sun and fun in one tidy package. Whether it’s admiring classical music on the Amalfi Coast, rocking out in St. Malo, or enjoying seaside theater in Ostend, we’ve got you covered.
What’s that? You still haven’t decided where to go this summer. Just give us a date and we’ll take care of the inspiration.
Festival fanatics love to boast of the rave they attended in Goa or the tribal festival in the Philippines. Don’t get us wrong, these are incredible experiences, but who wants to pay extravagant fees for world festival entertainment when there is so much festival fun right here in Europe.
Summer means its European music festival season. We’ve all seen local jaws drop when travelers enter a crowded space speaking in voices that … carry. An unspoken rule easily broken in Europe, it seems, is speaking quietly. So European music festivals are the perfect antidote to these hush-hush sneers and glares.
To help you decide where to go when, we’ve created a top 10 list of our favorite European music festivals for July and August where noise *is* approved.
Just remember, your ticket to noise expires once you leave the festival gates. So why not keep the noisemakers going? No one said you can’t do two summer festivals in Europe in one trip, right?
Let’s be honest, Iceland had a lot of hate thrown it’s way in recent weeks. If you were one of the unfortunate travelers stranded by the ash cloud I can’t blame you for siding with this ranting Scotsman. Even before Eyjafjallajokull (good luck pronouncing that one), the collapse of Iceland’s economy placed the small island nation at odds with Europe’s goodwill. A spewing volcano that cast a dark shadow over European travel for a week only made things go from bad to worse…way worse. So you hate Iceland, I get it.
But you can’t hold on to that hate forever, right? They say time heals all wounds, but a giant earth crater filled with lava is a tough wound to cover up. Here at Joobili we wanted to give you a few reasons to “un-hate” Iceland when the time is right. Think about it, how many countries have a recognized holiday for Beer Day? Iceland also puts on one hell of a music festival in October. And if you still can’t find it in your heart to forgive Iceland, then do it for the puffins. You’ll find all these and more on our list of 11 Reasons to Un-Hate Iceland. Just consider it…that’s all we’re asking.
Things were busy here at Joobili HQ over the weekend. Kate Russell from BBC Click, the UK’s most popular technology show, decided to feature us on her program. Check it out:
Not long ago I wrote a post about Joobili’s “5 minutes of fame” presentation at ITB Berlin. We just received the video from the conference organizers and thought we’d share it with all of you. Unfortunately you can’t see the slides in the video, but I’ve posted the presentation on slideshare if you’re interested.
This post is inspired by a request from our friends at Europe Budget Guide who asked us to suggest 3 tips for summer travelers on a budget. It was so hard to narrow it down to just 3 so I decided to write a post rounding out the list. For maximum fun and minimal budget give one of these 10 summer festivals a try:
Glastonbudget: Forget skyrocketing prices at Glastonbury, head for Glastonbudget and experience largest tribute band festival. Headliners this year include Oasish, The Fillers, Duran, Coldplace, Greendate, Blings of Leon and more.
Fete de la Musique: Professional and amateur musicians take over Paris for the day and offer outstanding concerts in parks, squares and the smallest corners of the city.
Tour de France: Pack a picnic and spend the day enjoying French cheese and wine as cyclist zoom by.
World Bodypainting Festival: Impressive artwork on a human canvass. Tickets are just 10 Euro and kids are free…but on second thought you might want to leave the kids at home.
Notting Hill Carnival: One of the biggest street festivals in the world! The entertainment is free and plentiful with parades of dancers and drummers sure to get any hips swinging.
Infiorato Flower Carpets: The streets in many Italian villages are literally paved in pedals of flowers. An amazing display of color and craftsmanship.
Amsterdam Pride: Flotillas of gay pride revelers rock the boat through central Amsterdam during the one of a kind Canal Parade. Gay or not, this is a party you don’t want to miss.
Edinburgh Fringe Festival: Fringe is the rebellious younger sibling of the Edinburgh International Festival with twice the fun at a fraction of the price.
Robin Hood Festival: Russel Crowe’s new Robin Hood film has everyone buzzing about our favorite outlaw. This festival is free fun for the whole family.
Buskers Bern Street Music Festival: The cobblestone streets of Bern fill with Europe’s best buskers ensuring free entertainment at every turn.
We are excited to officially announce our partnership with Athens Tourism. As you can see from the video, we feel pretty lucky to be working with such a dynamic destination. The team from Athens is really eager to jump headfirst into marketing their destination online and through social media. Joobili will be promoting Athens’ top events and festivals, as well as boosting Athens’ activities on Facebook and Twitter. Government back tourism agencies have a bad reputation for being the last to adopt new technologies, but Athens and a few others stand out to us as few examples where this reputation just doesn’t fit. Just another reason why Joobili loves Athens.
Joobili was recently invited to present our company at ITB Berlin, more specifically during the PhoCusWright summit on March 10 . For the uninitiated, this is the leading global trade show for the travel industry. Our slot is titled “5 Minutes of Fame” and is designed to highlight up and coming travel startups. The title made me laugh thinking about Andy Warhol’s famous quote, “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes.” Well, I guess we’ll settle for 5 minutes for fame…for now
Seriously though, it is a big honor for us to be invited to present our ideas to such a distinguished crowd (we are sandwiched between keynote presentations from the Global Director of Bing Travel and the CEO of FareCompare). I will be sticking around for a few days to catch the rest of the Expo so if you will be at ITB Berlin as well and would like to meet up just drop me an email or leave a comment.
Spoiler Alert: I’ve concluded the Ultimate Festival App still doesn’t exist. That conclusion might surprise you since Joobili recently launched its Sziget Festival App for one of Europe’s biggest music festivals. Don’t get me wrong, our festival apps have a lot of cool features and we plan to add even more. But we still haven’t built the ultimate festival app…yet. The good news is nobody else has either.
