Local Live - App Proposal
Emran Shafaq | es35478
Overview
For many Austin residents, live music plays a huge role in their recreational life. Dozens of venues will support local artists, and convention centers seem to always host internationally recognized musicians. It seems impossible for one to ignore the concert scene.
Unfortunately, information about these events is less available than one might think. For larger acts, advertisements are put up on billboards all around Austin for all to see. But for smaller acts, indie musicians that come to Austin monthly, their exposure is limited.
Spotify recently added a feature that allows users to choose an artist and then see whether they have any shows around them. However, the biggest issue with this is that it requires the user to go out of their way and look up specific artists to see whether they are coming to town. It is no different than looking them up on Google.
What I propose is a solution to this issue. Local Live is a service application that will automatically notify you when local bands that are similar to your favorite artists are performing nearby. There’s no need to go through hoops to try and find new music; the app will take care of it for you.
A prime feature of the app is its integration with other music streaming services. It will analyze your listening data from Spotify, determine your favorite artists, and automatically add local artists that are similar to the ones you enjoy.
With this application, music lovers will never miss the opportunity to find new music to enjoy. Local Live makes it easy to enjoy music, and support artists.

App type
	Local Live is meant to be purely service-oriented. Though it does require Spotify integration to open all the features, it still only relies on the user wanting to see acts. Music is an important part of my own life and I believe in doing whatever I can to help the scene grow.
	Likely users are anyone who enjoys local music and wants to see it performed live. As stated previously, these artists usually get little to no advertising or exposure. Having an app that can notify potential listeners would be great for artists and listeners alike.






Features
•	Automatic notification of events/concerts involving artists the user asks for
o	App will accommodate the user entering the name of an artist for the app to keep track of. It maintains a database and regularly checks whether the artists in the database have announced concert dates. If they are performing within a specific radius of the user’s current location, the app will notify the user that a date has been announced and provide a link to purchase tickets.
o	The app will also analyze the user’s listening habits and choose similar-sounding musicians that are local to the area to add to the database. This way, artists and users alike will be able to benefit from the app
•	Notification of events/concerts for user’s favorite Spotify artists
o	Spotify integration will allow the user to be notified of artists that they listen to the most. The Spotify API provides an option for retrieving a user’s most streamed artists. This would be called and then loaded into the database.
Dependencies
	The app will most heavily make use of the device’s Location Services. The most important part of sending the notifications is determining where the user is so their proximity to events can be gauged. I have never dealt with Location Services, so I will have to learn about it.
The next most important dependency is the Bands In Town API, which is what provides information about artists and their upcoming concerts. I have dealt with this API in the past for a web application, so hopefully once I am able to figure out how to use APIs in Android apps, the analysis should be simple.
Finally, the app will also use the Spotify API to pull the user’s favorite artists and artists similar to what the user already likes. Once again, I have used this API in the past and have already determined the specific requests that need to be made to get the necessary information.
One final required tool is the database that will store the user’s favorite artists. I have experience with databases in the context of web applications, but none with mobile apps. I may need to learn how to use a tool like Firebase to ensure this part of the app runs smoothly.

Scope of Initial Release
For the Beta release, I plan on getting the notification system working for user-supplied artists and for local artists similar to the user-supplied ones. I believe these are narrow enough in scope and require a very specific list of instructions to function properly. This will allow me to spend more time on the UI and making the app itself as seamless as possible.


Scope of Future Releases
I would like to include more methods of determining similar artists in the future. This may be accomplished through looking at similar genres instead of similar artists, or even just looking at the relative popularity of an artist in the users city. I would also like to include integration of other streaming services like last.fm or Google Play Music.

Operating Environment
The names of the user’s artists will be stored locally in a database. The app will then make a GET request to the Spotify API to retrieve the user’s most streamed artists. The app will also make requests to determine local artists that are similar-sounding to the one’s provided to the user. After successfully filling the database, the app will then make another GET request to the Bands In Town API to determine whether the artists is performing in a city near the user. The app will make a GET a request for each artist after a specified amount of time, most likely 24 hours. Finally, the information will be stored on the app for future reference and the user will be notified.

Competitive Analysis
Currently, the biggest competitor is Bands In Town, which offers very similar functionality. The biggest difference is that Bands In Town does not specifically try to suggest local artists, which Local Live will attempt to do. At the end of the day, this is a unique way for users to find music that they would not normally listen to, rather than get information about things they already enjoy.