Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)

Subject: BS: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: GUEST,Scott von folkjam.org
Date: 16 Jul 07 - 10:50 PM

Hello mudcatters.

A brief introduction to folkjam.org , a site that a friend and I built. Our goal is to make it much easier to find acoustic folk jam sessions at home and in new cities. Folks like you post the details of their favorite open sessions on the site, we take care of building maps and calendars to answer the "where" and "when" questions. To find a jam, you enter a city and the site shows you a handy map of nearby sessions.

Thanks for taking a look. And thanks to the Joe and the Clones(tm) for passing the message along.

Scott
Chief Fiddling Officer
www.folkjam.org

Subject: RE: BS: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: katlaughing
Date: 16 Jul 07 - 11:46 PM

That looks like a great service, Scott. Thanks for letting us know!

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: Mo the caller
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 10:37 AM

Does "jam" imply bluegrass, or any session?
And why, when I put Cheshire UK did it find jams near Cheshire CT?

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: Pilgrim
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 10:54 AM

"And why, when I put Cheshire UK did it find jams near Cheshire CT?"

I would hope that it's because it's a new site, Mo. Otherwise, you might be perturbed to know that, according to the website, there are no Jam sessions within twenty miles of London, Manchester, York or Whitby. Birmingham has one within the same radius.

Still, best of luck to Scott. He can only put on information that is given to him, after all.

Pilgrim

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: GUEST,PMB
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 11:02 AM

Don't forget that for the UK there's http://www.folkmap.co.uk/, and worldwide for Irish and related there's The Session (http://www.thesession.org/sessions/).

There does seem to be a bit of overlap here- perhaps Scott & co could add links to those sites, and ask them to reciprocate?

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: Mr Happy
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 11:32 AM

No jams were found near Chester, Cheshire

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: GUEST,Scott von folkjam.org
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 04:57 PM

Mo - The Cheshire CT vs UK is perhaps because you left the country selection as 'United States' or you typed it into the search box on top, in which case we just toss it at Google to see if the search terms can be geocoded as well as performing a text search on the site.

The site is for any acoustic session, Bluegrass, OT, Contra Dance, Irish.


PMB - Neither Shawn nor I were aware of folkmap.co.uk until about three months ago. We looked hard for a site like folkjam.org before we built it and found nothing like it. One big difference is that our coverage is as worldwide as Google's map interface. The second is that we take the repeat rules (3rd Sunday, etc) and figure out the dates and then make a calendar.

As for thesession.org I've used them for many years. My biggest gripe about the session listings there is organization. If you want to know where a session is happening or when, you have to dredge through a long list of sessions that are in the order in which they were submitted. I believe that somewhere in our link pages thesession.org and folkmap.co.uk are both listed. I'll double check.

Scott

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: GUEST,Scott von folkjam.org
Date: 17 Jul 07 - 05:06 PM

Pilgrim: "I would hope that it's because it's a new site, Mo. Otherwise, you might be perturbed to know..."

We are indeed a new site. We started in September 2006. Our US listings have taken a life of their own (we have over 400 recurring sessions and 100 or so festivals and about half again as many workshops. Many are now in the past and won't appear on the site until they are updated for next year). The UK listings are minimal.


Pilgrim: "Still, best of luck to Scott. He can only put on information that is given to him, after all."

Very true! I'll clarify something here though. You don't give the information to me. You sign up and post it directly and have editorial rights to the post for as long as you leave it up on the site. For us this is a huge differentiator over nearly every other jam sharing site we've ever used. It is not 'our list'. We built a platform for you and your lists. Our goal is keeping the information valid.

Some back-end stuff you don't see is validation. About twice a year folkjam.org automatically follows up on jam session postings asking the submitter to verify the information. If the person who posted the content does not respond, we ask again about a month later, then again a month after that and then pull the listing from the site. You won't find information on the site that is years out of date. Although given our age, that's true right now anyway. :)

Thanks for asking questions and prodding me now and again with slightly harder ones.

Scott
co-founder, www.folkjam.org

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: Llanfair
Date: 18 Jul 07 - 03:14 AM

I've registered and put in our Saturday afternoon market sessions. I had to use Shrewsbury as our nearest City, so it's now relocated in Powys, OK?

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: GUEST,Scott von folkjam.org
Date: 18 Jul 07 - 01:53 PM

Llanfair - thanks! We like it when listings outside of the US come in (we like the US ones too, but filling in the map outside the US is a goal).

On this - "I had to use Shrewsbury as our nearest City, so it's now relocated in Powys, OK" - write me privately via http://www.folkjam.org/feedback with the address you wanted to use. I don't know why you had to use Shrewsbury, and nor am I familiar with the area to know the relationship between Powys and Shrewsbury. I'd like to dig into what happened here.

We use a different provider to handle our address geocoding in the UK than we do anywhere due to the way the UK govt licenses survey data. If we have a problem with that provider I want to know.

Scott

Subject: RE: Share jam sessions (folkjam.org)
From: Llanfair
Date: 18 Jul 07 - 03:48 PM

I've done that, Scott. It is rather complicated. Thanks so much for your interest!!

Subject: FolkJam--Play Well With Others
From: Amos
Date: 30 May 10 - 10:59 AM

FolkJam--Play Well With Others is a terrific site for finding out what's going on where. Well organized and well-built. I just wandered into it, so I Guess I missed this thread back when, but I like it. Did you know there's a Bluegrass Jam in the Czech Republic?? WHo'da thought it!


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