Facebook invites. Everybody gets them and most ignore them. They just feel so impersonal. At best, you appreciate the thought; at worst, they’re an unappreciated afterthought. Granted the bigger the event, the better it’ll work on Facebook. But, it works the other way too. Gigs, plays and important birthdays, great; coffee with old friends, not so hot. In fact, there isn’t really any good, simple way to organise catch-ups with a small number of friends or family. Well, until Calendate.it.
Calendate.it’s mission is to make catching up with friends easier. You sign in via Facebook (though the app will never post to your wall, only access your friend data for invites) and start creating events from there. The focus is very much on small-scale gatherings. Facebook doesn’t quite cut it in this niche of the market – creating an event page is too grand a gesture – and as for group messaging, by the time everyone’s finished trying to be humorous, half the details have been lost in the melee and you‘re left scrolling wildly around the thread in barely contained frustration. Not to mention the annoying participants that exited the conversation seconds after skimming the first message. Calendate.it fills that middle ground; solid details with a distinct lack of fuss.
It’s simple: name your event, set the venue, time, and give a brief description. Done! IF you want to get a bit advanced, assign a hashtag to your event. If you and your friends use that hashtag on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc, Calendate.it automatically aggregates all that social media information onto a single ‘Story’ wall. It’s a cool idea, and one that lends itself to the core benefit of the app; exclusivity. I don’t mean that in a negative, snobby connotation; this app exists exclusively to bring people together. Facebook has a thousand different uses, but organizing small catch-ups just isn’t one of them. Notifications and messages get lost so easily. With the smart, simple Calendate.it, people will use it because they want to, not because it’s an extra feature.
Hook up for free at the iTunes store to start organising some meet-ups today.
