Posting events to Sponty is now even easier!

Posting events to Sponty has just gotten even easier. You can now post events from Twitter. Like this:

U2 surprise performance at the somerville theater at 2:00 pm #sponty

or this:

cupcakes + dance party at The Enormous Room, Cambridge, MA on 1/10 9:00 pm #sponty

The format is basically:
{what} at {where} at/on {time} #sponty

Don’t forget the #sponty hashtag.

Your events will show up in a couple minutes at http://www.thesponty.com/twitter_user_name

If you’ve never used Sponty before, go ahead and try posting from twitter.  If you already have a Sponty account, please login and hook up to Twitter from this page: http://www.thesponty.com/settings#twitter

Sponty 1.1 is now available on the App Store

Sponty 1.1 is now available on the app store. The new version is even faster. We also did the following enhancements:

1. You can now see the names of all the people who are down with an event. Previously, you could only see their photos:

2. The app can now tell you which of the people in your iPhone’s contact list are also on Sponty:

Get it now here: http://www.thesponty.com/iphone

Be hangoutable, now in more cities.

We’ve just extended Sponty’s regional networks into a few more cities. Sponty is now available in: Ann Arbor, Ausin, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Miami, Minneapolis, Montreal, New York, San Francisco, Toronto, Vancouver and DC.

Since we’re based out of Boston, Sponty has networks for the following fine institutions in Boston/Cambridge: Northeastern, Boston University, Harvard, MIT and HBS.

Is Sponty not available in your city? Send us a note.

Why Sponty?

How did people discover fun social activities before cell phones and text messaging happened?

Since I don’t know for sure, here’s a hypothetical scenario.  Let’s talk about Chad; a junior at Boston University in 1993.  Chad works at Best Buy part-time and is just heading home on a Friday evening hoping to hang out with some of his buds.  Figuring out where the best parties were at has gotten a lot tougher since Chad moved out of the dorms.  Things were much easier then because the dorms’ hallway chats were where he heard about what was happening later on in the day.  These days, he has to rely on his newly purchased answering machine with a mini-tape delivering messages from a handful of his buddies who may have been nice enough to keep him posted.  No one was going to be home to pick up their phone when he got home, so calling people who were already out was not an option.  

Fast forward to the early part of this century.  Julie is bored in class and she’s already sending text messages to her closest friends trying to put together a girls’ night out.

Now in 2009, Natasha tweets and updates her Facebook status in the cafeteria to see who else wants to go see Ratatat at the House of Blues.  But a few people say “awesome”, and 3 people “like” it, and a handful retweet it.  Eventually Natasha resorts to her default tools - calling and texting - and she gets Emily to come see Ratatat with her. The show was completely badass.

The basic problems remains the same, but the quality of the solution is as good as the tools you use.  In Chad’s case, he relied on an answering machine which gave him few options,  and he always wondered what he was missing out on.  Julia’s options were limited to who she actually felt comfortable texting or calling.  She knew that her extended circle of more than twenty friends surely had ideas of other fun things to do that night.  Natasha’s status updates and tweets got drowned in the noise, and her friends missed out on Ratatat.  

Your friends, and other people in the city collectively know about the best events in town, like a surprise U2 concert at the Somerville Theater or the circus animals crossing the Harvard Bridge.  If only you had a place to see their intentions ahead of time.  Sponty allows you to discover the best things happening around the city so you can get your friends “off” and out into the streets.  Sponty is about discovering fun events through people.

Sponty now hooks up with your Facebook, and your Twitter.

We just rolled out a new feature: Auto-posts to Facebook and Twitter from Sponty. So now your not so hangoutable friends can find out about the fun things you find on Sponty’s Featured Feeds.

Here is what a Facebook post looks like:

You can enable the hookup in your settings page.

Cheers,

marram (and the Sponty Team).

Be hangoutable. Now on your iPhone or iPod Touch.

The awesome folks at Apple have been gracious enough to let us be one of over 80,000 apps on the App Store.  We feel special.

Yes people, Sponty is now officially available on the iTunes App Store! You can download it here: http://www.thesponty.com/iphone

And by the way, there is also a secret. Only Sponty for the iPhone can create a certain type of event. To unlock the feature, shake your phone a few times once in the Post screen. Read Thrillist for more.

We’re not sure why most iPhone apps use male avatars for missing profile images, friend requests and tab icons. We think female avatars look better:

A.R.T

Shows at the American Repertory Theater, are now featured on Sponty.