Before attending DevBootcamp I explored the PHP based Drupal CMS. IdolOrder.com is a fan opinion site for The Voice and American Idol.
It currently has over a thousand data-filled pages. My goal was to create a far more interactive site to share impressions and memories than the existing hodge-podge of forums, hard to access videos, and lost and forgotten discussions from the time of airing years ago.
The site will remain in it’s current concept mode. Unfortunately the country isn’t obsessing over the amateur performers anymore, the networks have gotten stricter with IP, and there is too much data-entry involved to maintain it as a hobby-only site.
Check out the history of American Idol at IdolOrder.com
In my opinion, TV networks should really create sites like this to profit from their existing libraries.
There is a ‘long-tail’ value of their entire library of past performances and they should be monetizing each and every performance by having them available on their own accounts hosted at YouTube, Vimeo or wherever they can earn the most.
Fans should be able to quickly navigate to other performances of the same song… quickly review all the songs a singer has done that season, or what other fellow contestants have sung that season.
Users should have opportunities to reflect with votes on every performance, and have separate comment threads for each episode, each performance, and overall thoughts and news on past contestants in thread.
Shortly after the show these will be news orientated with fans encouraged to continue a lively discussion, making the weekly show have that much more mind-share.
Quick to load and simple to navigate, the encyclopedic content would add a sense of historical relevance to their TV properties which would add value to content in both short-term and long-term ways.
Note - yes the look and feel is dated (it was 2013), and I’d be unlikely to use the same CMS structure today. However, it was quite an exercise that introduced me to how and enterprise-capable CMS operates.
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