Shindig makes online book readings better

I write a fair amount about blog tours and other online promotions, one of the most effective and fun being with video readings for groups or book clubs. I've tried a lot of platforms for this kind of an event, with mixed results. Skype works well when it works, but it can be quite unreliable. Google Hangouts is good and getting better, but they still have a nine-person limit on the hangout and their share of quirks.

Shindig

I'm excited right now about Shindig because it's a video chat and reading tool for entertainers that seems to have been designed with authors in mind. Here's what they say about themselves:

Shindig is a NYC start-up committed to unleashing the unrealized potential of video chat. Shindig's proprietary technology enables you to give an online reading, talk, or interview in front of an online group of 50 to 1000. In Shindig, you can share the stage with fans and take questions from audience members. Additionally Shindig adds a unique social dimension to events by allowing fans themselves to also interact with one another in private video chats.

What I love most is that they have two features that I haven't found anywhere else in this space:

1. Automatic recording: Every time you have one of these events, figuring out how to document it is a major task. With Shindig, it's just part of the package.

2. Side conversations: In every video chat tool I've ever used, there is one person talking and everyone else listens, and any kind of text chat is completely public in a single stream. Shindig allows attendees to have side chats around specific parts of the reading that are private, which is more like how a class or book club really interacts. Rather than clicking around the Internet for something else when attention wanders, attendees can check in with someone else they know and stay engaged.

There are more advantages that I think makes Shindig well worth checking out for any author out there. Let me know what you think in the comments.

Image courtesy of Shindig homepage screenshot