Thanks, Santo! Congratulations on the premiere of your show! We’re glad VirtualCallboard could be a part of it.

Here are a few highlights:

• Added the ability to edit attendance
• Added the ability to mark someone’s attendance as “left early”
• Significantly rewrote the reports module, resolving several issues with the way reports are saved and mailed
• Added the ability to choose a date range for the House Count graph
• Compatibility with Internet Explorer 8
• Allow users to edit reports without resending them
• Better sorting on availability time frames
• Fixed rolls for open calls

We are excited we were able to tackle so many customer-found defects in this release.  Keep sending us your feedback by using the “Send Feedback” link at the top of your VirtualCallboard.  As always, we will try to meet all of our customer’s needs.

We also are excited about the first step we put in place toward having a fully functioning Developer API (application programing interface) for VirtualCallboard.  This will allow developers to interface 3rd party systems with VirtualCallboard in the future.  If you are interested in developing for VirtualCallboard, we highly suggest you contact us at support@virtualcallboard.com or visit the developers page of VirtualCallboard.com.

For more information about VirtualCallboard, you can visit the website or try the live demo.

VirtualCallboard is Spreading

Last year was a growth year for VirtualCallboard.  We more than doubled the number of customers using the service last year.  These customers represented nearly every aspect of live entertainment: secondary education, higher education, touring, regional/LORT theater, dinner theater… we even had a film production company and a church production group use VirtualCallboard last year!

We are trying to look at all the ways we can to get the word out as effectively as possible.  We have a Facebook page (be our friend!) and we are on Twitter (follow us!) and we have our website at www.virtualcallboard.com.  We still get most of our customers, though, from search engines.

To help improve the industry referrals, we plan offer great rewards and incentives this year for customers who bring their friends on to VirtualCallboard.  We will have a range of gifts or discounts available for people who refer others in the industry to use our software.  Stay tuned for more info as we figure out how we are going to exactly do this.

We’ll also be at the national USITT Stage Expo in March.  If you need a pass to see the Stage Expo, let us know.  We’ve got freebies to give away!

VirtualCallboard is Improving

Development on VirtualCallboard continues.  We are hoping to produce consistent releases this year (every two months or so) with various bug fixes and enhancements to the system.

One large thing we are attempting to do in the short term is develop an API (application programing interface) so that other applications can interface with VirtualCallboard.  This would benefit companies who may have other systems (i.e. a booking system) that they would like to integrate with VirtualCallboard.   This also paves the way for future mobile apps (smartphones, tablets, etc).  You can get more information as this takes shape at http://www.virtualcallboard.com/developers/

New Stuff on the Horizon

We’ve also been slowly working on some new product ideas in the background.  We’re not quite ready to share them with the world yet, but in the meantime, if you know any good developers (or are one yourself) who could give us a hand developing these apps, please let us know.

Thanks!

Sam Anderson
President/Founder
EmptySpace TechnologyLLC

VirtualCallboard 1.1.1 was released this morning to all our customers.

This released focused significant effort on upgrading the File Sharing functions of the site.  You can now view more details about files, edit those details, and see the files in a more organized and efficient manner.

We also fixed several other minor issues in Reports and enabled you to change your time zone anywhere in the website.

Feel free to send us your feedback on the new features or any other issue you are having by emailing support@virtualcallboard.com.

Thanks for using VirtualCallboard, and have a great day!

Here are some of the highlights from this release:

• Significantly improved the design of the Add a Call page.
• Added WYSIWYG editor for Discussions, Notes, and Announcements
• An existing report template can now be copied into a new report template and modified
• Added the permissions for a Level 2 user to upload files
• Users can now delete notes, reports, and other items from their view
• Added a confirmation dialogue that prevents the user from accidentally navigating backward and losing data when filing a report or inputing other long forms.
• Increased the reliability of adding or editing some elements of the website
• Independently track who submits and edits reports

This has been one of our most aggressive releases yet, fixing over 30 bugs and enhancing several feaetures.  We hope you notice the improvements.

Feel free to send us your feedback on the new features or any other issue you are having by emailing support@virtualcallboard.com.

Thanks for using VirtualCallboard, and have a great day!

Saturday May 22 at 12pm (Central)

This will be a live, online event hosted through WebEx. You will be able to see and hear us as we talk about new features of VirtualCallboard and take your questions.

This session is for anyone interested in learning more about VirtualCallboard.

Our first session will focus on the messaging features of VirtualCallboard: Notes & Email, Discussions, and Announcements. We will talk about where we are and highlight some features you might not know about.

To Attend:

1) Click here to register for the event. You will receive an email confirmation with instructions for attending.

2) Mark your calendar for May 22 @ 12pm (that’s Central time!)

3) On May 22 @ 12pm: Click the link in your email confirmation to open the WebEx meeting center and enter your phone number so the meeting can dial you and you can hear the meeting’s audio.

If you have questions, please email us at support@virtualcallboard.com.

Thursday May 13 at 4pm (Central)

This will be a live, online event hosted through WebEx.  You will be able to see and hear us as we talk about new features of VirtualCallboard and take your questions.

This session is for anyone interested in learning more about VirtualCallboard.

Our first session will focus on the messaging features of VirtualCallboard: Notes & Email, Discussions, and Announcements.  We will talk about where we are and highlight some features you might not know about.

To Attend:

1) Click here to register for the event.  You will receive an email confirmation with instructions for attending.

2) Mark your calendar for May 13 @ 4pm (that’s Central time!)

3) On May 13 @ 4pm: Click the link in your email confirmation to open the WebEx meeting center and enter your phone number so the meeting can dial you and you can hear the meeting’s audio.

If you have questions, please email us at support@virtualcallboard.com.

Here are some of the highlights from this release:

• Downloadable Contact Sheet (in comma-separated file (CSV) format) .
• Enhancements to Discussions:
  • Discussions are now sorted by the time and date they were last updated.
  • Clicking on a discussion item from the home page takes you to the entire thread, highlighting the entry that was clicked.
• Increased reliability of uploading large files using the File Sharing utility.

Feel free to send us your feedback by on the new features by emailing support@virtualcallboard.com.

Thanks for using VirtualCallboard, and have a great day!

We’ve returned and recovered from a very enjoyable and successful time in Kansas City where we had a booth at USITT’s (United States Institute of Theater Technology) annual conference and Stage Expo..

We met a lot of great people, signed up some new customers for VirtualCallboard, and even managed to squeeze in a conference session or two.

This year was the fourth conference I’ve been to where there was one or more sessions which discussed management and new communication technologies.  We’re definitely seeing an upward trend in the number of people turning to the internet to find better ways to manage and disseminate company information.  We’re very confident in our product’s ability to do this quickly, privately and securely.

We donated a 6 month VirtualCallboard subscription for the Institute to auction off at their New (and Old) Products Showcase, and we’d like to thank Andrea Shimmoeller who generously supported the Institute and won the auction!  Andrea came by on Friday and got her VirtualCallboard up and running.

We also want to congratulate the winners of the drawing we held at our booth for a free 6 month subscription to VirtualCallboard.

And the winner is:

Steven Williams, University of Nebraska at Omaha

Thanks for everyone’s interest and support at the convention.  We are geared up and ready to grow!

This year’s convention will be in Kansas City, Missouri from Wednesday March 31st to Friday April 2nd.

We’ll be in the commercial tables section, near all the universities and non-profit theater companies.

Check out our listing on the Stage Expo map.

See you in Kansas City.

Sam